Politicians should be shouting – it’s on the house!
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The Emperor (Kevin Rudd) was back at it again recently when he commented on Australia’s skyrocketing population and quipped “I actually believe in a big Australia. I make no apology for that.” Well, Australia actually does need apologies, because critical infrastructure advice continues to fall on the deaf ears of our elected politicians.
After all, there must be something seriously amiss when past King of Spin, “Bobby Dazzler” Carr starts penning and pontificating on population policies in the Sydney Morning Herald. “Perish the thought that we can handle a bigger population” wrote the Dazzler “Some Australians must have felt similar estrangement when they read federal Finance Minister Lindsay Tanner’s defence of Australia’s runaway immigration targets, playfully comparing our population densities with those of Bangladesh.”
Then the Carr crash (with accompanying air – bag), “That Tanner is one of the best minds in federal politics will only deepen the rift between 90 per cent of Australians and their political and business leadership over population policy, or rather the absence of any policy except “more”.” It would now appear that “Bobby Dazzler” is over the selective hearing condition that plagued him in his reign of the Premier State from 1995 – 2005. The transformation went from Premier State to State of Decay to Fort Crumble and even though it did not happen overnight, it is now a nightmare.
Maybe this vacant plot of land might make a nice residential subdivision with very little chance of flooding?
Sydney to squeeze in 640,000 new homes by Matthew Moore – Urban Affairs Editor the Sydney Morning Herald identified “A forty per cent increase in Sydney’s population over the next 20 years means the State Government has no option but to open up scores of suburbs for new developments, according to radical proposal for Sydney to build 640,000 new dwellings.”
For this to happen, Fort Crumble would need a plan so I went in search and found that it does not look pretty, as Andrew Clennell of the Sydney Morning Herald revealed. Rees desperate to stand for something “In this respect he hopes to get something on the radar at Macquarie Street that has been lacking for the past 12 months – POLICY.”
They obviously can’t hear but thankfully they can read. “Number one on his list is transport. The transport blueprint that Rees promises to hand down sometime over the next three weeks is likely to be treated with some scepticism.” I guess he means this is like a homeless person entering Star City and requesting a seat at the High Rollers Table – after all Fort Crumble is broke. Back to Andrew “This is because of the large number of projects that Labor has promised, and then not delivered, in 14 years in power.”
Oops “Bobby Dazzler” was at the helm for ten of those years – although Fort Crumble would win a wood chopping event as they sure know how to wield that political axe.
- North West Rail link (promised in 1998 and axed)
- North West Metro (announced and axed)
- Bondi Beach rail link (promised then axed)
- Parramatta to Epping rail link (halved to Epping to Chatswood rail link)
- CBD/second Harbour crossing rail link (promised and axed)
- F6 through southern Sydney, (on again, off again)
- M5 duplication (long delayed)
- M4 East extension (long delayed)
Last month’s parliamentary pay increases and the fact that our Fort Crumble premier should be (and is) the highest “paid premier” in Australia have been vindicated. Alex Gooding had this interesting analogy on transport in the Sydney Morning Herald – Three times denied: western Sydney misses out on transport, again (great read) which really adds a poignant perspective on the political decision making processes.
Ongoing calamities when “ Paid Premier” Nathan Rees overturned an earlier decision to contribute $45.000 million for the newly anointed AFL’s western Sydney franchise to build a new home ground – again out came that axe (perish the thought of constituents contemplating the axing our “Paid Premier”)
Macquarie Equities Research – this week released this compelling graph in its Australian economics report. Sketching the outlook for housing “this note examines the recent trends in the housing sector and looks ahead to key factors to watch in 2010.” Looks like a tsunami to me.
Macquarie Equities Research – “In our view, the key factors to consider are the favourable fundamental determinants – strong population growth and constrained supply – alongside the deteriorating level of affordability. With these factors working in opposite directions, it suggests that the more extreme forecasts of a house price bubble or a price collapse will continue to prove wide of the mark.” More of this report in next week’s edition.
Back to Andrew Clennell’s report “Sydney is experiencing transport gridlock. Public transport services in the CBD are overcrowded, even though train services are inadequate and in many suburbs non-existent. In response, transport plans are announced and then re-announced. New rail lines are proposed but then abandoned and governments blame increasing costs and global financial problems.” He did forget to mention that over the last fourteen years the NSW government also collected the highest amount of taxes in Australia’s history. In real estate terms it would be “dilapidated home – run down, neglected, yet with plenty of potential”.
So let’s look at what is happening locally. I went to Wayne Swan’s Nation Building website to see what is happening in Mosman and North Sydney municipalities. Indeed Nation Building personified – bicycle paths, perimeter fencing, a shade structure, and a few water bubblers -no wonder our economy has rebounded with such exhilarating speed. All that it takes is a plan!
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Our councils are doing it tough mentally and physically although they are making plenty out of parking fines as Vikki Campion reported in The Daily Telegraph. Where you’ll cop a parking fine. North Sydney Council collected $7,000,000 which was up 48 per cent from $4,700,000 and Mosman Council $1,700,000 up 89 per cent from $910,000. It should also be noted that Mosman Council has been aggressively investing in new parking meters so one could expect a significant revenue increase with this return on investment.
In retrospect, if our population continues to explode it would then not be unreasonable to draw a conclusion that our water supplies face significant declines too (it did happen well before the proposed population explosion). Now when you renovate or build a new home, you must provide water tanks in accordance with local Council building regulations.
So why, in any Mosman or North Sydney parks, ovals or reserves, have the respective Councils not installed water tanks? After all they have only to connect to their very own street storm water. Look at the number of parks, ovals and reserves located below street level. Balmoral Oval, Rosherville Reserve, Forsyth Park, Tunks Park, Primrose Park, Cremorne Point Reserve, Sirius Cove Reserve, Allan Border Oval, Rawson Park, Spit Reserve and Reid Park. These are but a few that are all entirely dam- dependent and coincidentally, always have their sprinklers on when it is raining.
Warragamba Dam is presently at 55 per cent capacity and declining – although the Kurnell desalination plant is soon to be completed and that will supply up to 15 per cent of Sydney’s water. Of course we can’t leave out evaporation as this coincides with policy that has also evaporated.
Then again I have never been one to water down an edition.
Cheers ^__^
For this week’s recorded Mosman real estate, Cremorne real estate, Cremorne Point real estate, Neutral Bay real estate and Cammeray real estate sales www.rwm.com.au/news/
