Armidale vs the city

I am in the process of purchasing a house in Armidale.  I currently live in North Sydney.

Rates paid last year for the Armidale house were $2974.13. In North Sydney I paid $1223.69.   

I recognise that this may be due to differences in land value (the Armidale block is larger), and that there are economies of scale involved,  in that Armidale Regional Council must provide similar services for a much smaller population than North Sydney’s, but it is inequitable that individual ratepayers in Armidale must bear increased costs due to a smaller population.

The reason I am re-locating is that the current State government is spending billions on roads and other works in Sydney which it designates State Significant Infrastructure – when in reality they serve only Sydney.   

In the process, the Warringah Freeway Upgrade has destroyed much of the beauty and amenity of North Sydney by brutally removing all trees and other vegetation which previously screened the freeway from the surrounding areas.  It has done this by ignoring the objections of residents and over-riding North Sydney Council’s planning and environmental regulations.

This is just the most recent of the assaults committed by Transport for NSW on other parts of Sydney: for example, the compulsory acquisition and bulldozing of houses in Sydney’s historic garden suburb of Haberfield, and the destruction of the historic avenue of fig trees in Alison Road, on the edge of Centennial Park, Randwick, to make way for the light rail to run past the race course. Nothing much is offered in return for these atrocities – in North Sydney’s case we are told it will cut 15 minutes off our drive to the airport (but in ten minutes by train I can be at Central to catch a country train to Armidale – a slower trip, yes but cheaper and with far less hassle than driving to the airport!).

Regional councils north of, and including Armidale, are being manipulated by Transport for NSW into dismantling now disused railway tracks  and turning the route into a “Rail Trail” for cyclists and hikers, promising that tourism will bring economic benefits to the community. That is,  while Transport for NSW will dispense with the costs of maintaining the tracks and reinstating a much needed rail service between Armidale and the Queensland border,  the councils (or rather, rate-payers) will bear the cost of building and maintaining the “rail trails”. 

Arguably a reinstated rail service for carrying both freight and passengers would be of greater economic benefit to the region than the rail trails which would be used by a very much smaller demographic.  I having nothing against bike and hike trails per se, but why must they be at the expense of a much needed train service? Why can’t New England have both?  

A “managed decline in services ” is not an acceptable alternative if the Armidale Regional Council is unsuccessful in its application to increase rates.  What services would decline, and who would decide?  Furthermore, allowing some services such as building maintenance to decline,  could incur greater costs in the future.  Reduction in staff numbers is also not an option since council staff provide services, and they and their jobs are part of Armidale’s economy. 

I suggest that the State government should re-allocate some of the billions it proposes to spend in Sydney on “State Significant Infrastructure”, to regional local governments to enable them to provide good services which attract people to move there, thus relieving Sydney of the need to plan for more growth, and relieving individual rate payers of the need to pay extortionate rates to maintain basic services as well as those which make regional towns and cities civilised and desirable places to live.