Not a Bad Place to Be on Planet Earth

Not a Bad Place to Be on Planet Earth

Sydney is one of the world’s truly great cities. Over the Queen’s Birthday long weekend I went to the Museum of Contemporary Art on a stunningly sunny Saturday at the invitation of Creative Sydney. Down at the harbour front the beaming masses strolled along the promenade past the nineteenth century heritage terraces towards the billowing sails of the Sydney Opera House. All in all, it was not a bad place to be on planet earth.

At the front desk of the MCA, I told a local arts aficionado my name. “YOU are Lawrence Gibbons,” he proclaimed. “Who the hell are you and why are on a panel with some of the most prominent arts people in this town?”

“The problem with Sydney” I replied, “is they’ll let anyone in.”

I had been invited to participate in a debate as to whether or not Sydney had lost its cultural edge. Also invited to speak were NSW Minister for the Arts, Virginia Judge;, Shadow Minister, Anthony Roberts; the CEO of the Sydney Opera House, Richard Evans; Executive Director of the Sydney Festival, Josephine Ridge; and Tim Jones, the Artistic Director and General Manager of the Seymour Centre. I was invited to discuss whether Sydney is falling behind or leading the way as a culturally significant global city on a panel moderated by Peter Carr, the CEO of the Sydney Development Agency.  The consensus opinion of the participants was that Sydney generously funds and supports some impressive signature events and venues.

“What about the struggling underdogs?” I asked the participants. At the risk of being controversial, my position was that Sydney’s big cultural institutions may be well fed but that our unique precincts are underrated by the locals. Bondi, Balmain, Enmore and Surry Hills are some of the world’s best urban neighbourhoods, despite government’s efforts to shut down the party from King Street to Kings Cross., “Sydney still has a vibrant night life,” I proclaimed, even after the government introduced pokies at the expense of live entertainment, sent in the sniffer dogs to harass and intimidate the gay party scene and sent fifteen police officers to close down one X rated arcade in the Cross just last month, Sydney is still one of the world’s best cities.”

“Culture is more than a few well funded elite arts institutions around the harbour foreshore. In greater Newtown alone, there is a vibrant underground scene of more than a dozen live performance spaces, flourishing despite inadequate government funding and a regulatory framework that makes it almost impossible for a small business owner to operate.”

Our unique urban villages are under threat. Small businesses from Oxford Street to Glebe Point Road are doing it tough. Fifteen years ago, when the City Hub was launched, Glebe was a thriving urban enclave chock-a-block full of little guys offering original, non homogenised goods and services. Nowadays the Broadway Shopping Centre generates more revenue than the whole of Glebe. Across town, Oxford Street’s daytime economy has been sucked dry by Westfield Bondi Junction. Today there are more retail shops in the Bondi Junction mega mall than there are in the whole of the Bondi basin. And Westfield delivers the same sanitised corporate consumer culture as chain franchise outlets all around the globe. “If you were to join me on a tour of San Francisco,” I told the audience, “you wouldn’t want to visit the new Westfield on Market Street.”

Meanwhile, here in NSW, rather than support, champion and celebrate the few remaining small businesses that create a unique urban village in what remains of Bondi, Darlinghurst and Newtown, the Keneally government is allowing major retail barns to open in Sydney without even assessing their economic impact on Sydney’s authentic, old fashioned high streets.  It is little wonder tourists are spending less and less time in this town. International tourists used to spend three days in Sydney, now they spend less than a day and a half before they fly off to Melbourne or Queensland to find an authentic Australian experience.

Fifteen years ago this August, when the first issue of the City Hub hit the streets, we pledged “to champion local Australian arts and culture. To counter the cultural cringe. To define what is next. To seek what is new.” In order to celebrate the harbour city’s truly unique local businesses and support the struggling creative industries that make Sydney special, each year we produce our annual BEST OF SYDNEY guide. This week you will find a readership poll in the pages of this paper. Take the time to tell us what you value, treasure and support. Sydney is more than a soulless shopping centre, a chain store and a pretty harbour.  The results of the readership poll will appear in our August 19th FIFTEENTH ANNIVERSARY edition of the City Hub because, lets face it, Sydney really is the world’s best city all in all and it deserves our support.

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