In essence, it said that baby boomers should sell their family homes on big blocks to the next generation with young kids, and the oldies should move on to smaller premises. Read article here.
Well, that really got my ire (being as seeing as how I'm one of those boomers....without a large backyard, I might add).
I grew up in a suburb about 12 kms from the centre of Sydney. It was mainly developed post WW2. The "Depression-era" parents raised their baby-boomer children there. We had a modest, 2 bedroom fibro house on a large block.
Well, 10 years ago, Mum and Dad sold that house and moved to a smaller, multi-unit dwelling (in Sydney parlance a 'villa' - in some places called 'cluster housing'....7 single-storey houses on a double block....the medium density developments of the 1970s).
And here's what is being built on that block and next door TODAY at 36 and 38 St Georges Rd, Bexley.
When "the oldies" move out, the current generation of kids don't get backyards to play in. The backyard disappears under acres of brick and concrete.
So these photos are from my childhood, and that of my son in the 1990s, and the bricks today.
1. Dad working in his veggie garden in the early 1970s. This part of the yard was a chook run when we bought the house in 1968. Over the back fence are early villa homes.
2. My sister tending backyard lemon tree, about 1971
3 & 4 My son also enjoyed "grandma's backyard"
Here's what's being built today on that suburban backyard that is supposed to be sold to Generations X & Y for their kids to play on. Tell that to the developers!
It is the developers who are the problem here, building endless tracts of suburbs on agriculturally rich land, and the government levels just let them do it. Parkland is an afterthought at best.
ReplyDelete