Tag Archives: Sydney
In with the old, and Out with the new.
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Collection of clouds
A collection of cloud photos from today.
Now Leasing on George St
Across the pedestrian crossing to the Blacket building on the corner of George and King streets. All the window filled with ‘Now Leasing’ signs. A little hard to see in the small version, but an interesting tile of text in red and green.
From bridge to bridge
A view from Anzac Bride across to the Sydney Harbour Bridge. Taken as a bus carried me over the bridge to Balmain.
I think it is quite good for a short taken with a camera phone as the bus hurled along, but I would have liked something better on me to take the phone.
No longer the news
Once News Plus, now minus news. It seems the news agent in the food court under Myer in the Sydney CDB has gone. Replaced by a Angus & Robertson book sale.
As an interesting aside, the food court is covered in advertising for the Dymocks store in George St.
Competing factions chains I suppose.
Bus and car meet on George and Liverpool
On the corner of George and Liverpool streets this afternoon I noticed this altercation between a tour bus and a car. The bus driver was trying to get the car to reverse away.
Looks like the bus tried to turn into Liverpool St from the centre lane, and the car tried to undertake it.
Of course, all this is just the opinion of a untrained casual observer.
It did block traffic down one side of George street for a while.
Can’t seem to find any mention of the incident on the RTA Sydney traffic reports. Which, I find, have been usefuly turned into twitter feeds:
sydneytraffic
sydtraffic_city
sydtraffic_nth
sydneytraffic_nw
sydneytraffic_sw
Feeling squashed on the train?
Do you catch the train at peek hour in Sydney and feel a little squashed? An article in the SMH on Monday stated that 73.6 percent of trains were overloaded, some with up to 145% capacity usage!
Of course 100% capacity only means that everyone gets a seat. So the extra 45% are left standing.
Now, if you’ve ever been to Tokyo train station at peak hour you will know that they must measure capacity reached when you can’t squash any more people on to the train.
All the Tokyo trains have seats along the walls, not in rows like Sydney. So there is much more standing room. Allowing people to be packed in more densly.
And while the morning peak hour is quite crowded, at night between 11pm and 12am is much worse. As trains stop running shortly after 12am, everyone makes a mad dash to get home, and the people are often squashed into trains like sardines.
And is not just trains that are packed. The station platforms are wall to wall people too.
Though all the people are quite orderly about it all, lining up in nice queues to get on the train. Of course, there are 4 (or 6) sets of doors on each side of the carraige. And the trains actually stop so doors line up to where they are marked on the platform.
Light rail in Chinatown, Sydney
The light rail outside Market City, the Paddy’s market building, in Chinatown Sydney.
Transport for all need not cost $600b: expert
A SWEEPING, multibillion-dollar transport plan, to be unveiled next week in a discussion paper from a leading transport researcher, Garry Glazebrook, of the University of Technology, Sydney, proposes linking almost every home, office and university in Sydney to upgraded train, tram and bus services within 30 years.
The worst thing about moving is…
…lack of connection.
And while they both are important, I am not just talking about the Internet or phone here.
I moved back to Sydney a couple of weeks ago. Most stuff is still in boxes. Though we finally have a fridge again after a week. The base utilities (water, gas, electricity) work. But the house is a communication black hole.
I’ve lived in Sydney most of my life, but after a year in Japan it all doesn’t feel quite right. There is a lot to get used to again.
Everyone speaks and understands English (most of the time). Which makes life easier. But you have to learn the correct etiquette again.
Most of the shops are the same. Although some have moved or been renovated in the year I was away. Buses seem mostly the same, just more expensive. And you get to watch yourself on their TV these days.
Found one mobile phone, it still even had some charge and some credit, though the microphone is defective and you have to yell down the phone at people (so much for private calls). And without a land line, its best to go use a public phone for those calls where they put you in a queue and leave you on hold for ages.
And in this day and age, lack on an Internet connection really sucks. Can’t check email or web sites to work out where to get stuff, how you do something, etc. So much for the ‘check our website for details‘ you see everywhere.
