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Planning Minister Matthew Guy has denied the state government has hit the economic ''panic button'' by approving five major tower projects in the city.


Mr Guy approved on Tuesday five towers expected to cost $557 million to build and to create more than 2000 apartments and up to 4000 jobs.


''It is a matter of packaging them up, obviously, bringing forward five in one day, which I think is important, because it sends a signal,'' he said. ''It sends a signal to investors and to the construction industry that the city is going to go forward and that we have a pipeline for our construction industry.''


Matthew Guy.

Planning Minister Matthew Guy. Photo: Luis Enrique Ascui



But the announcement, dubbed ''Super Tuesday'' by the government, prompted RMIT planning expert Michael Buxton to label the planning minister ''Melbourne's greatest-ever vandal''.


Professor Buxton said the towers that were being approved were not the ones that middle-income Melburnians wanted to buy into. He said young and middle-aged people were more interested in medium-density properties, not small but expensive apartments in the central business district.


''They're pulling down Melbourne to satisfy a few rich developers and overseas developers. Matthew Guy is not going to stop until Melbourne is destroyed. It's very serious for Melbourne. Once it's gone, it's gone forever.''


Mr Guy rebutted criticism that small blocks with towering high-rise buildings could turn Melbourne into a Hong Kong-style city, saying the state needed to show it was a place of jobs and growth.


He said Melbourne was like London and New York in that it had more and more people wanting to live in the city, even though they had families.


Speaking at the Phoenix Apartments construction site at 82 Flinders Street, Mr Guy said more small blocks would need to have high-rise development.


''People often say to me, why do I keep approving tall buildings? My answer is because we have to optimise the space we have got in our central city area … it is not infinite.''


The Phoenix, built by developer Equiset, uses an H-shape construction technique without columns. It will use the same process at 464 Collins Street, one of the developments approved on Tuesday. The Collins Street site is another narrow site but its three-storey facade, known as Makers Mark, will be kept.