Marsden Park: The Devil of Urban Sprawl 

Hey all! My apologies about the pronunciation of Schofields. Recieved a few comments about it, thought I'd pin this so that everyone knows that I know now 😊. Thanks for watching!

I visited a mate who bought in Marsden Park. It's creepy to drive through. Feels like a glitch in the matrix.

Do a video on Edmondson Park/Leppington where the infrastructure was built before the houses

I've been wanting to see a channel like yours to cover Sydney and my god its finally around! Already instantly subscribed! I subscribed because you pretty much discuss the things that go through my mind as I drive around Sydney on a daily basis and so many what if, why, how come, etc. questions popup in my head. My fiance lives near Marsden Park and I agree with the inadequate infrastructure in the surrounding areas. Especially, Western Sydney (being promoted as the future of Sydney) lacks so much basic infrastructure that if you were to cover every single piece of land now with building, it would be clogged full of traffic and would turn the sky from blue to grey. (Also doesn't help I play too much City Skylines these days :P)

One thing that doesn't get mentioned much which is common in these areas, is that every house has a dark roof! With no trees and lots more hot surface area, the microclimate of these suburb temperatures are rising and so more pumping the A/C.

Overall a nice informative video. You did mention that the better alternative to greenfield development is highrise living (which I agree with), and highrise living definitely has its place, but it's important to mention there is a middle ground which has a lot of value. Semi detached housing or 3-4 storey apartments infilling Sydney much like in many European cities would be great to see. This also allows existing suburbs to have a gradual population influx rather than the sudden jumps that occur with new large apartment developments

I live in Singapore for five years. While I'm not suggesting that Singapore is perfect society that Australia should directly copy, Australian state and local governments, could learn a lot from Singapore about best practice town planning. One suburb I lived in while in Singapore was adjacent to a new suburb being developed. The very FIRST thing that was built for the suburb was a metro train station. Only when the metro station was operational did they start building housing (apartment towers). One other thing that Singapore does well is that when an apartment complex is built the ground floor of the complex often included space for small local retail outlets. The retail outlest are often occupied by core businesses such as mini-market, fruit and vegetable, GP clinic, hair dresser, etc. May be you could do a future video on cities around the world that do town planning well. If you want to learn more about how Singapore does town planning the Singapore Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) website has a lot of good information.

love your channel man. Finally someone talks about this. Not to mention the local road width is just ridiculous. Houses are getting more rooms on a narrow block of land, with a single garage so street parking is inevitable. But the road is so narrow to drive through in between. Councils and developers are getting greedier by days.

Don't forget that one problem with high rises in Australia, well at least Sydney, are poor building standards and materials. The Opal Towers issue, for example, is enough to turn people off high rise living, not to mention high strata costs, restrictive, body cooperates, etc, beyond the issue of squeezing a bunch of people into a small space. Imagine not being able to open a window because the neighbours are smoking? Or hearing another neighbour, with the runs, going to the loo at 3am, or hearing the couple upstairs have sex or fight...or both?

As a lifelong Sydneysider, this channel is the best thing ever, I love it. Sums up how I feel about most things here in such great detail, keep it up

This is a very important issue which the state government should be aware of. Developments like Marsden Park, Box Hill and North Kellyville experience significant infrastructure lag, with residents waiting years on end before schools, shopping centres and adequate transport are in place for these communities. Also, communities in Oran Park, Catherine Field and Gregory Hills have been waiting for nearly 10 years for a new primary school, with the recent Barramurra Public School being built in 2021, and Gregory Hills Public School still in planning. I have also seen estates, such as Colebee, near Marsden Park, be developed without any schools as part of the masterplan, with new communities expected to utilise existing schools in nearby suburbs (such as Dean Park in Colebee's case) which are already overcapacity, leading to the need for the state government to fund more demountables for schools. The other annoying thing about the Sydney Metro is that the state government did not bother building another 3km's of track to connect the Metro with the existing Schofields Station. Extending the Metro from Tallawong to Schofields would create an interchange which would make it easier for residents commuting on the Richmond line north of Schofields and at Schofields to travel to North Sydney without the need of a bus (such as to Macquarie Park and Chatswood) - which would have also benefitted communities in Marsden Park by incentivising public transport use and reduce travel times during the peak hours. Shame that due to poor planning, the projected 20,000+ residents in the future living in the vicinity of Marsden Park have to wait another 10-20 years before a Metro link is potentially built at Marsden Park, to connect to Schofields, St Marys and the upcoming Western Sydney Airport!

Just got recommended this video out of the blue and I have to say, you're spot on with pretty much all of these points. I lived in Marsden Park as a renter for more than three years, leaving in mid-2021, and the first things that became apparent were the complete lack of infrastructure and the fact that all the houses are built so cheaply that, while they appear at first glance to be quite upcsale, modern living spaces, they may as well be made of paper. The walls are thin enough you can put holes in the plaster by just leaning too hard on the wrong spot. The entire development, and all the surrounding ones in Riverstone, Schofields, The Ponds, etc., have put capacity increase into overdrive at the expense of *everything* else. It was extremely frustrating to live there. I do, however, miss the incredibly easy access to Sydney Business Park, and the many wonderful restaurants too. There are some nice things about Marsden Park, even if they're far outweighed by the negatives. Edit to add: Also there are no trees! A few saplings along the nature strips, but good lord there's just so little foliage it's horrible.

As a passing Seppo, I'm just happy to see that we're not the only ones consistently buggering up our urban planning.

Great to see your perspective broadening from an early focus that was very traffic-engineering driven (pardon-the-pun) to a broad spectrum of urban planning concerns. With your editing skills I foresee good things for this channel (Y). P.S. The other thing that is absolutely maddening about development in the outer burbs is the building of commuter carparks (and not much else! Maybe a bus stop?) around stations, rather than medium-density housing & commercial/retail precincts...which are miles away. Absolutely shockingly bad land use adjacent to fantastic new transport infrastructure that cost tens of billions of dollars.

I travel Richmond Rd since 1994 and never saw so much traffic heading into Richmond but now it is constant. Councils and State departments use government red tape to slow any progress an have the minimal staff to do it. Developers want to do minimal effort for maximum return.

Beautifully presented with some good points made. I live in North Kellyville moved here in 2015 and one one of the first to move into the suburb. We have definitely suffered from infrastructure lag. The main road Hezlett Rd was only upgraded last year. Still waiting for the promised open spaces and sporting fields.

Brilliant content and appreciate your effort! Trying best to go through every videos!

I don't know how stumbled upon your channel - but I am glad I did. Love your your well researched content. Well done and more power to your channel!

The metro link between Tallawong and St Marys is vital to give Western Sydney a second link into the Sydney CBD. The new airport will need that link to reduce the congestion on the existing western rail line.

Great content! I live around the Elara estate and agree with your observations. I bought into this estate because of the planned Metro which to my surprise got ommitted from the latest Metro rail plan. On the point of opening shops with the launch of the estate, It will be difficult because the shops can go bust if not enough buyers move into it. However, this can be remediated if the government release the lands slowly so buyers are controlled and make sure a planned estate gets buyers. Then again you create a supply issue which will make houses even more expensive.

Cool videos on your channel, and as someone who has seen the effects on the area since Marsden Park has been put in, you raise some good points. What we've seen more recently is that, being built on a flood plain, namely for South Creek, heavy rains have had more horrific effects on the surrounding areas, all that water now has to go somewhere else - towns like Windsor and Riverstone have been underwater more in the past few years than the past decades!

Very good video, interesting to watch! I’m very glad I’ve come across your channel, keep doing what you’re doing!

I live at Hassall Grove, near the M7. I have delivered many loads of concrete to Marsden Park. Also the widened Richmond Rd, Costco, Bunnings etc. All through Schofields, Tallawong etc, etc. Traffic everywhere. Marsden Park is built on a flood plain. Building right across from Northbourne Public School. Now that Abell Rd has opened, things are better.

I hate how these suburbs have houses crammed in like sardines, never would buy a house with a tiny backyard like that.. Rather a nice apartment (not a crappy small one that looks big on fancy rendering pictures) next to a decent park..

All of these problems considered, its sad that a lot of people move to Marsden Park, knowing there are issues with roads, schools, and most of all, being on a flood plain. These cookie cutter homes also only have a few good years before major problems start to appear because they were built so quickly. There simply isnt a lot of choice left in Sydney if families need a decent sized family home. These arent even decent sized. Often the back yards of these homes are the size of a postage stamp. I get that affordability was a factor once, but the issues are now widely known and these houses aren't even affordable anymore. A train station and other proper infrastructure in this suburb is literally decades away. Terrible government letting people down.

Love the vid. I'm a teacher in this suburb. Our school has capacity for about 800-1000 students in its actual building. We currently have 1600 at this time. Many demountable classes, including double story ones 🤯

Great informative video young fella! Love ya work! ☺️

This is really good content, well done.

Well put together. 😊

I feel so sorry for young families in Sydney. The obvious answer is to move somewhere else (like brisbane) that is far more reasonable lifestyle wise. But when you’re born and raised in a place, you don’t want to move away from family.

I’d love you to do a video on Wolli Creek - a classic example of an inner suburb created around a new railway station, with the intention of making it a hub, only to see minimal development for more than 10 years, and then for development to make up for lost time over the following ten years, increasing population by 1400% within two Census periods, with virtually zero improvement to road infrastructure. And what work has been done has only made it more difficult to get into, out of and around the suburb. Similar story as for Marsden Park as far as ways in and out of the suburb-sure there’s more than one, but they’re all clogged up. I’d love to have a chat with you about this if you think it’s an option. I’ve lived in this area for 12 years and have watched it become horribly overdeveloped with totally inadequate focus given to equivalent infrastructure enhancement. I know you’d do a cracker of a video on this place! Keep up the great work! :)

Great work.

Driving during peak hour at Elara boulevard and Richmond road is the worst and honestly i don’t know how they missed all of the planning especially a town in a flood zone

This presentation was really well designed and had exceptional points. It's good to see that the infrastructure is finally playing catchup, although it is not so good it's 5 years late. I find the point about the metro connection quite important. The connection between St Mary's and Tallawong metro station appears to be growing in need, and a station in Schofields and Marsden Park is definitely needed. The government built the North West metro line to serve the north west Sydney, and the Western Sydney Airport to serve all of Western Sydney from the north to south. The only problem is, the airport metro will not be connecting the north west with the airport. It will only be really serving the Central Western Sydney region. I will mention, however, that an extension of the metro from the new airport down south east to Glenfield is in planning, which is interesting. If the metro connection to Tallawong was built, and it was extended down to Glenfield, you would have a metro line running through the heart of Western Sydney, and there to serve future development. Now that's what I would call good planning. But alas, knowing our government, it unfortunately will likely not happen for a long time. Maybe if the community pesters the government enough it might happen sooner, but we all know how that generally turns out. Anyway great video, I thought I would share some of my thoughts on this topic.

So glad to have moved to the fantastic blue mountains and let Sydneysiders fight it out . Thanks for your channel it’s great to see someone covering a discipline most of us know so little about , a chance to learn something 🤙

We lived there for a while, and between the terrible landlord and the estate itself, it was a nightmare. We were some of the first people to move into Elara in 2017. We couldn't get phone reception inside the house, and barely got it outside. It was so bad, I had to drag myself outside in an emergency, because I couldn't even call 000. The state member didn't give a shit either, she said it was between the telcos and Stocklands. The drains stank like shit (literally), so the whole giant septic tank situation made sense when someone told us about it after we moved out. We needed to turn the air conditioning on whenever it got over 30 degrees, because the place was so damn hot. So hot, it would regularly get up to 50C in summer, and the heat killed everything. Whenever Richmond Road got closed (which happened regularly, because its such an enormous blackspot), we would get stuck and often couldn't leave or come home until the road opened. Loads of people would go cross country to get in and out of the suburb. Even little things, like birdlife, was sad... there were no birds there, because there were no trees, and what little grassland remained was being built on, so it was eerily silent there during the day. We couldn't get out of there fast enough.

While it's nowhere near the outskirts of Sydney, the disaster that has become Hurstville is definitely worth an investigation from a planning/end result point of view. Would love to see you tackle it. Keep up the great work Sharath!

I can't believe I didn't see this video sooner. Very interesting and important topic.

Great video mate. Spot on.

Can you do a video about daceyville nsw Australia’s first garden city

Excellent clip. BTW Schofields is not pronounced 'Showfields'. The 'sch' is 'hard', like it is in the word 'school'. So it's more like 'Skowfields'. I grew up in a new development, but at least then they were on a quarter acre block with a back yard, but no sewerage for a few years and the need to travel 40 minutes to get to a department store.

Thankyou for your content. I really enjoyed watching this video 👍

another great video mate ! marsden park popped outta nowhere !

Nice video and channel. I live near Macarthur Heights, an estate similar to this. It only has 2 entrances/exits to/from the rest of Campbelltown CBD. One of the main selling points of this estate was its proximity to transport and walkable distance (referring to Macarthur station and Macarthur Squarewhich is poorly connected to the estate, and the WSU being located on its grounds). However there are 0 public bus stops here, despite some parts being 3 km away from the station. This isn't too bad most of the time, however in the scorching heat of the summer and for the elderly it is really inconvenient and disconnected. The nearest schools are more than 5 km away and are inaccessible through public transport. An example of development supposed to drive infrastructure rather than the other way around.

Very good informational video brother

I agree maybe call it greed by useless developers as you say. Those houses look dreadful. Bad planning

Another great video..

Great video!

True, you can squeeze people into high rise. But a lot of people can't deal with living that way. Certainly, I can't do apartment living. I need my space to sprawl.

And people give high density living a hard time, in spite of its benefits-all while ignoring the destructive mentally vacant issues of urban sprawl. Thanks for highlighting this.

Great stuff! I can't believe what the local and state govts have done to Western Sydney over the last 25 years. They seem to feel that they can just expand the place infinitely, sprawling out endlessly. Square kilometers of ugly, unsustainable suburb over 50km from the centre. Australia needs a vision for the future which doesn't include Sydney and Melbourne growing into 6 million + slums.

Another great video on a pertinent issue of Sydney. What I want to know is why the infrstructure always comes last in these urban endeavours - is it some sort of government policy? Because it regularly seems to be the case. The same thing with all these buildings cropping up everywhere now, no regard for how people are going to deal with traffic. The design of some of these houses is questionable too - probably because of the housing boom they made some buildings that were not well designed, poorly made or cut some vital corners ie Mascot Towers. I note in the top-down shots that those new houses sometimes have no way from the front to the backyard except through the house itself, and the yard is quite small. In some flats and houses the design is such that the bathrooms don't have access to air because it's been put in the middle of the plan and are in danger of getting mouldy. Also inadequate power sockets in the right places. Having cleaned some places in the Hills area it's clear there are some things that don't make sense in the designs.

Absolutely 100% agree! This is happening all over Sydney, and is getting silly at this point. Once it's there, it's there...

Great video. It's complicated when it comes to infrastructure.. I'm an urban designer practicing urban development in Sydney and have participated in multiple major new precincts' planning in / near Sydney. The infrastructure are not always government's responsibility to deliver - sometimes it's developers' as a condition for rezonong approval. The infrastructure is normally planned based on population forecast in the most efficient manner, aka crowded. If you do a little research on planning history of Shenzhen, China you will find planning can never catchup with how the cities actually grow, and the infrastructure is always lagging for new towns, which is not ideal and the government should play a more 'demanding' role on. This is also the process of nurturing the sense of community, and yeah.. takes time

will be interesting to see how the Sydney outer orbital/m9 will improve the area

Good video mate 👍

Top video mate well done

We live near Marshen Park, now it takes me litterally 15 minutes to exit my street due to the non stop traffic every morning and what one was a 10 minute drive to Costco now takes me at least 40 minutes to get to when there’s traffic which is pretty much everyday between 9 to 5

Another one of these new places is Gables and Box Hill, near Rouse Hill. Driving through them looks identical to Marsden Park suburbs

My knowledge even Oran Park and Emerald Hills. Not sure yet about Austral part of Liverpool council. Could you please do a study case on THEM ... Thanks

Sydney needs better apartment quility standard. More people don't really trust the building quility of the new apartments since a set of quility issues in 2020 like Mascot Tower. Those new area like Green Square or Mascot are designed good for walk or cycling but people worried about the building quility of those new apartments.

A few things to point out, as someone who has managed and developed some of these estates including Elara, Oran Park etc. Although the high-rise living does have it's benefits of far better open space and surroundings, it's not possible to have something like that near Marsden park. For one, the land is not zoned for that style of development. Developer would not build schools and shopping centres without anyone actually living within the estate? It would be a complete waste of money, an asset that would be sitting there empty until residents started building houses. The Elara estate is split into 6 Precincts, the shopping centre was built just after the 6th precinct was completed. The secondary access road onto Richmond road built, whilst precinct 6 was completed. The single access road into the estate was a huge problem and should've been planned better but remember a lot of these infrastructure builds rely heavily upon TfNSW as the ulimate asset owner, not the developer. There is a very big argument for the clustered housing and lack of trees etc, but i do agree it's not something that is overly appealing, but affordable, i would love to talk more into it but it will take too long lol. I'm more than open for a chat if you are interested in knowing more about these masterplanned estates.

The Australian dream is impractical. Not everyone can own a house in the suburbs.

The expected timeframe between the first estate and completion of all infrastructure projects required can take up to 20 years.

I would like to raise another significant problem in Marsden Park business district. Chifley Glade road is a high risk to pedestrians since there is no pedestrian crossing People who shop on each side of the street wanting to cross the road putting their life at risk. It is totally up to drivers to give way or not There is no signage no line marking or anything Locals spend millions on those 4 big business and can not even walk safely in the district Something has to be done before someone gets hurt Unfortunately it is other-way around someone will get hurt than government will action Thank you

This was great… not just a critique but a suggestion and a plea for a better life for those who want houses in Sydney

The US is pretty famous for Sprawl and Canada too but in Melbourne and Sydney it is on a crazy level.

Props to you for creating good content like this based on Sydney

Interesting learning

New housing estates are selling blocks of land from 300m2 to 450m2 for the "big blocks" It's insane that it's allowed to happen, so many copy paste homes in a small area. How do people know which one is there's

Also, if you’re doing to build so many properties that can’t accomodate a pool, you need to also build a local leisure/aquatic centre.

The whole stretch from starting from the M7, along Richmond Road, pass the business park and Marsden Park, up to Blacktown Road needed better attention. A suburb built without infrastructure being installed and upgraded has created a traffic nightmare. Lanes that go from two, to three, to one, and intersections with short phasing lights, and even shorter turning lanes. I live on the otherside of South Creek and avoid driving through Marsden Park if I can.

100% nailed it. Overcrammed cookie cutter homes built by the cheapest bidders with the most underplanned road infrastructure imaginable. The Hills district also suffers from this sadly. The Deparment of Planning and Environment of NSW is to blame. They had no plan and allowed this to happen.

Just wanted to add that Harrington park as a suburb itself is really planned and the houses are done real well and aren’t squished together compared to Oran park next door but infrastructure issues are Definitely there with the biggest issue in the area being the lack of public schools to meet the demand of students as all the schools in the area including private/catholic schools are even at capacity. But in recent years the area has grown a lot with things such as shops and other facilities rapidly popping up all over the place however the roads are incredibly congested and leave much to be desired.

great vid brah

Blacktown council is the worst of worst. Developers are doing whatever they want. Elara in Marsden Park is the best example of expensive slum. Extremely small blocks, narrow roads and the horrible traffic on Richmond Road.

Gr8 video. Imagine the rental crisis if these estate developments and apartment developments never happened though?

It's a common problem in Wollongong as well. Shell Cove, West Dapto and the back of Albion Park are all known to have/had simular issues.

It is baffling to me why the state government is building the St Marys to Western Sydney Airport metro line before joining Tallawong to St Marys.

Sprawl is a bloody nightmare in Victoria as well. I live in Geelong, and every time I enter Melbourne on the train all I see is copy-paste houses crammed together, some with zero walking space inbetween them. Even in my town, it was once a peaceful quiet place and then the government just thought it was good to fucking take up the countryside and ruin the rural feel. And this kind of thing has kept going on since 2007.

I despise the way our urban landscape has become. Tiny blocks, narrow roads, cramped, cheap looking houses where if you fart in your bathroom, your neighbour will hear it, and a claustrophobic neighbourhood. YUK !!! I have no idea how people can live like this. You drive down a suburban street and cars parked on either side only allows one car to pass, so others have to stop to give way. This is absolutely pathetic for a country with so much land. This modern era sucks !

Loving your videos but I want to highlight you missed talking about Sydney Business Park next door. Where Ikea is located. This was around before Elara and there was a massive missed opportunity to direct transport from Tallawong to it so people had a reason to travel the other direction away from Macquarie Park, Chatswood and towards the city. Your argument for highrise residential would have applied to this area if the transport was up to scratch. Turning it into another Norwest or Macquarie Park.

Omg how trippy, I've only just come across this video. I live in Marsden Park/Colebee my husband, kids and I moved here into the first estate that was put up that was 7yrs ago, there was still only 5 completed houses in my street at the time, now it's completed and there is 18 houses in my little street. The huge outdoor paintball range was still there and in business when we moved in, it's gone now along with all the trees and bush that was there it's now fully built up. So yeah there are HUGE problems here in regards to infrastructure, there is still only 1 high school in the area and until last year it only catered for classes up to year 10, the high school is actually in Riverstone so it's been there a VERY long time, only 2 years ago did it finally receive funding to build more classrooms but that was only because it was finally going to cater for year 11 and 12 not because of the huge number of people moving to the area, in some of my daughter's classes there is between 35 and 40 students in 1 class alone with just the 1 teacher, they have no teacher for woodwork or metal work so those classes aren't available, many of the elective subjects aren't available due to no qualified teachers being there, it's not a "desirable" school to teach in, previous to Marsden Park and Stonecutters Ridge estates being built the older suburbs here are very very run down alot of public housing and people on the poverty line, quite a bit of drugs and crime especially involving teenagers so unfortunately quite a bit of riff raff attending the school so a lot of teachers won't apply for jobs there and those that do generally don't stay long, it has a massive turn over of staff, but as I said it literally is the ONLY high school in approximately a 20km radius besides the private schools I mention below but are really out of most peoples price range especially when you have more than 1 child like myself. There are 3 private schools within a 15km radius to Marsden Park I checked them out the cheapest one was $5000 per year, that excludes uniforms, books, excursions, additional fees for classes like cooking, photography etc etc, the $5000 literally only covers the enrolment fee, the other 2 schools are $10,000 and $12,000 per year each and like the first one that only covers the enrolment fees, everything else is extra. So yeah 1 public high school, I had 3 kids in school, now only 2, for my high school kids to catch the only bus that comes once an hour to get to school is a 1km walk from our house, and that might not sound to bad even though it is especially in the pouring rain or the blistering sun, the biggest problem is in fact that almost half of the walk there is no footpath, they would have to walk on the side of the road it is EXTREMELY dangerous my kids have nearly been hit many times plus the road has ridiculous amounts of pot holes in it and loose gravel everywhere and several times my kids have been hit with loose stones that have been kicked up by passing cars, i had to stop allowing them to walk I was so worried i was going to lose one of my kids, I also have a primary school aged child too and due to very strict zoning rules she couldn't not attend the primary school that was one street away from the high school which is 6.5kms from my home, we are in another school's zone that is in the opposite direction to the high school and they start and finish at the same time, so my high school kids would have to wait for me to pick up the younger child before picking them up and due to all the homes being built there was a lot of construction with roads and the 7.2km drive between the 2 schools on average would take a minimum of 45mins to get there and that was on a good day, most days it was almost an hour, then the same amount of time to get home, I would have to do this morning and afternoon 4hrs of driving a day for school drop off and pick up, the amount of petrol I was using was crazy, it was awful, it's a bit better now most of the road construction has stopped, but it's still a pain in the butt. Luckily we have a Woolworths that opened almost 4yrs ago but before that you would have to go all the way to plumptom, which meant going on Richmond Rd and then Rooty Hill north Rd, about a 6km drive too but the 2 roads I mentioned above are an absolute nightmare with traffic plus it's an on and off ramp for the M7 also. The train station is about 7.5kms away but there is not a single bus that gets your there, you have to take 2 different buses which takes close to 1hr and a half so long as you don't miss your connecting bus, it's pretty bad. So transport is a massive problem, schools are a massive problem, the council do not provide green bins for garden waste, grass clippings, that is really hard because to mow your lawn means you use up at least half of your red bins space, tried using the recycling bin but they often have people that check the bin and if the wrong contents are in it it won't be collected just a sticker put on top telling you why. The main roads are a traffic nightmare straight from hell. The rent here in my opinion is very pricey, the town houses that have been built here are roughly $600+ a week, my neighbour has a 3 bedroom house with 1 bathroom, 1 car garage and pays $730 a week, most houses like mine are $800+ a week and for us it's very very hard on a single income and we don't have a choice my hubby is in the Air Force and is based here at Richmond. I know people in the city pay more but we are about a 1 and a half hours drive from the city so to me it doesn't count, we aren't paying high rent for "convenience", still the price of rent in Sydney no matter where you live is just disgusting and is destroying people's lives. We have 4 petrol station with in about a 15k radius and they are literally all next to each other on the main road, 3 on 1 side of the road, side by side and the 4th is directly across the road and its not uncommon for the petrol to be 10c, 15c, 20c more expensive than other suburbs because there are no other choices for quite a while and would be inconvenient to the local residents to go elsewhere. Oh we have a Costco and it has a petrol station too but its a $65 yearly fee to be able to use it, it's worth it just to be able to use the petrol station there but sometimes (speaking from experience) having a spare $65 to spend just on a membership isn't always "just laying around" Anyways if they fixed the school problem, especially the high school problem, fixed the horrid traffic issue and probably most importantly the public transport issue, because honestly if you do not have a car it's impossible to live here, the public transport issue is that dire here, but if they fixed all that, this place would be awesome. For anybody that just read this whole thing, thanks didn't mean for it do be so long yet I feel I've barely scratched the surface of the issues here, but thanks for reading.

It's always struck me as so appalling how small the lot sizes are too in these new release areas. When you go out west for affordability, you really hope for some adequate private open space. 400m2 in the west vs 600-800m2 in the eastablished parts of sydeny.

Can you please explain how is Boxhill infrastructure to buy property to settle down with kids.

I used to work at the toll like 6yrs across the road from costco and i never hot any traffic. Things must of grown pretty fast

What happened to the public school on Garfield road west? Was 70 kids when I went there in 2002

I completely agree about Marsden Park. It epitomises all that is bad about excessive urban expansion. BUT, let's remember this: Australia for some years had a huge 2% annual immigration rate. That is now down to 1%, but that is still alot. So where is everyone going to go? It can either go up into apartment ghettos, or out into suburban ghettos. In fact, Sydney is doing both, and not only do state governments have zero control over the increasing population, but Sydney and Melbourne take most of it. In either 2018 or 2019, Sydney had more than 100,000 extra residents in a year, for the first time. That is ALOT of people! The tiny blocks of land are a disgrace, but hey if they were a liveable size, the urban sprawl would be proportionately worse. Unfortunately, amenity destroying, CO2 output increasing, and completely pointless artificial population growth is stupidly viewed as desirable by almost everyone. Absurdly, it is touted as the solution to the 'ageing population problem', even though that problem is *caused* by a slowdown in the rate of population growth, which is in turn, inevitable. Unless the same % growth rate continues forever, which of course it cannot. So next time someone whines about climate change, CO2 output, congested roads, urban sprawl and so on, just ask them if they support mass migration. If they do, tell them it's their fault, as it is.

If the government is already behind on infrastructure for existing growth areas, how will it get ahead so it can put infrastructure in place before they start building new suburbs?

thought you had way more than 1k subs, subscribed

One bit of infrastructure it does have is cycleways along the main roads with easy access to the M7 cycleway as well as along South St/ Schofields Road. Unfortunately you may find that, literally, about 25% of your cycling time may actually be spent waiting at traffic lights.

LET'S GOOO NEW VIDEO

All that and not to mention the Richmond Rd & Rooty Hill Rd intersection most people from Elara are forced to

Totally agree with you

What are your views for Macquarie park old townhouses

There are a number of reasons families prefer houses over apartments that go beyond stigma, ask someone with kids.

great vid

I agree with you on more greenery, every single house in Marsden park is supposed to have a tree infront of it but most of them get ripped out during construction and never put back in. On the other hand, I work as a landscaper, civil and concrete contractor. I’ve done a lot of landscape and seen a lot of landscape designed to minimise gardens and be low maintenance. I’ve talked a lot of people out of artificial turf. Most people I’ve worked with complain that there’s too much grass for them to mow 😂 People love the cookie cutter houses because they don’t have time for gardens and they don’t want to live in apartments so it serves a purpose and has its compromises. The modern family has more people working and less time for property maintenance. The houses in Marsden park are probably some of the most expensive properties in Sydney by square meter.

Marsden Park, the suburb that was so poorly planned that Richmond Road is always clogged to a brim to the point that I stopped going there due to the traffic woes. The only other ways out of the suburb is essentially drive through St Marys Road/Stoney Creek Road through Berkshire Park & Shanes Park which is a good 30-40 minute diversion or another alternative for me as I live in Plumpton is to go through Deans Park and Colebee through Symonds Road, Stonecutters Drive and Alderton Drive which is a good 10-15 minute rat run just to avoid the traffic at the direct route from Rooty Hill Rd Nth to Richmond Road. Even then, all the above options still require you to drive through Richmond Road in significantly different directions

The experience of Marsden Park and its like should prompt us to look again at whence we came-the inner city. In the distant past, I lived in a two-bedroom cottage in Balmain built on 150m2 of land. In its wisdom, the Valuer General's computer claims the unimproved value of this property is $2 million. The lot size in recent subdivisions is around 400m2 but it is not as if inner city lot sizes result in unpopular slums. I'd rather live in that cottage than in one of the high rise apartments surrounding our train stations even if it had majestic views.