The State Versus the City
The State Government of NSW changed hands not so very long ago, moving from Labor to Liberal, and the new Premier, Barry O’Farrell, has been finding his feet ever since. Not unlike his predecessors in the job, however, he has found the Lord Mayor of Sydney, Clover Moore, irksome.
Under Bob Carr, Labor NSW attempted a power play, redefining the various council boundaries, including joining South Sydney Council with the City of Sydney Council, attempting to wrest control for their preferred administrators. It backfired. Clover went rogue, becoming an independent, but retaining her position as Lord Mayor and her seat in State Parliament. Why should that be so? Because she does a good job for her parliamentary constituency and for the city. She has remained a gadfly to so-called conservative commentators and all extreme right politicians, including those on the Labor Right.
She had an idea that the City of Sydney, made up as it is of disparate suburbs, many quite small, but all expressing different characteristics in one degree or another, could share its various offerings in a way that made it more liveable overall. Part of her idea was to introduce environmental sustainability efforts, such as co-generation of power in council buildings, but also getting the various bike paths that had been introduced over the years to actually link up, encouraging us to stop relying so much on private vehicles. Better bus service, maybe an eventual return of trams, and even the introduction of traffic-free zones within the CBD were in the works. These various efforts could also have the effect of getting the people who visit the city regularly for work to linger for a meal or an event outside of work. If the city has more to offer and more ways to ease the problems of getting in and out, we’d feel better about sticking around. Hell, we might even think about living here, instead of commuting back and forth from near and far suburbs. All very laudable.
But bicycles are like vegetarianism: they generate a nearly inexplicable derision, if they are not outright despised. Those cyclists, with their tights and their invariable disregard for their own safety or that of others, whizzing through traffic, except when they’re going slower than the traffic on the streets they’re forced to share from the lack of bike lanes that they don’t deserve, because they wear tights and won’t ever ring their bells as they approach a pedestrian and . . . foam, foam, foam. What is it about bikes in the city that’s so bad?
Anyway, Clover started joining up the bike lanes, putting some in where there had been none, too, and keeping pedestrian and vehicular traffic separated. My GOD! She spent money, taxpayer money on bicyclists!
So now here comes Barry, and before anything can be done in regard to city streets within the City of Sydney, a committee of seven members will be consulted, four of whom are appointed by Barry, and three from the City. Any chance of progress? Only if progress meets Barry’s definition, which, so far, appears to be none.
Barry’s concern, ostensibly, is the effect to city businesses when bike lanes reduce on-street parking, or if no-car zones would reduce accessibility to businesses by people in cars. As if there weren’t other ways to get there (Barry: the trains! The buses! Didn’t you say you were going to fix those?).
If traffic is a problem, Barry, it isn’t bicycles that are the cause, it’s that you (and previous governments) have done nothing but create new suburbs with little else than highways that join onto city streets not capable of accepting the volume. Newtown’s King Street and City Road can’t handle what they receive. Even Parramatta Road can’t manage the volume from the west – even on weekends it’s easily overwhelmed.
What’s needed isn’t an intervention on bicycles. What’s really needed is better planning. Parramatta and Chatswood have the potential to be true alternative city centres, creating corridors that could feed into one another. Trams, light rail, improvements to the existing passenger trains that aren’t just schedule tweaks to hide poor on-time performance, more buses, more alternatives to driving into the city, these would help.
It won’t happen. Not anymore. We had some momentum for a little while, but the derailleurs are on now.

Update: See, it's all about depowering Clover. What bastardry.