Sydney at a Glance
The City of Sydney Local Government Area (the “City’) covers approximately 26.15 square kilometres, within the Sydney metropolitan area. The current local government area was created in 2004 through the amalgamation of the former South Sydney and City of Sydney local government areas. It comprises the Central Business District (CBD), the Rocks, Millers Point, Ultimo, Pyrmont, Surry Hills, Woolloomooloo, Kings Cross, Elizabeth Bay, Rushcutters Bay, Darlinghurst, Chippendale, Darlington, Camperdown, Forest Lodge, Glebe, Alexandria, Beaconsfield, Centennial Park, Erskineville, Newtown, Redfern, Rosebery, Waterloo, and Zetland.
Within the boundaries of the City of Sydney, waterways and some public areas are under the executive control of various State Government agencies. These include the Sydney Harbour Foreshores Authority, the Department of Transport, Sydney Ports Corporation, the Centennial and Moore Park Trust and the Royal Botanic Gardens and Domain Trust. Other State Government agencies also have environmental responsibilities in the Sydney LGA. The Commonwealth Department of Defence has administrative control over Garden Island. Additionally the Redfern-Waterloo Authority has been created to co-ordinate revitalisation of the Redfern, Waterloo, Eveleigh and Darlington areas through urban renewal, human services provision and job creation.
The Physical Environment and Climate
The City of Sydney is located at 33 degrees 52 minutes South and 151 degrees 12 minutes East. Sydney Harbour forms approximately a quarter of the City’s boundaries.
Sydney’s annual average of sunshine is almost seven hours a day. Its temperature ranges from a moderate average winter minimum of 9 and a maximum of 17 degrees Celsius to a peak summer maximum average of 26 degrees Celsius.
Sydney’s rainfall averages 1213 mm a year, with an average of 11 wet days per month. More than 40% of this falls between March and June. Annual rainfall in 2008 was 1083mm.
The City in a Global Context
At a metropolitan level, Sydney, as Australia’s global city, is also the financial and business services hub of Australia. Of all foreign and domestic banks in Australia, 82% are located in Sydney.
The financial services workforce of Sydney is nearly half the size of London’s and New York City’s. Sydney was recently assessed as the 9th ranked Global Financial Centre in a study commissioned by the Greater London Authority.
The Global and World City research group at Loughborough University in the UK have released their updated 2008 rankings of cities. Sydney now ranks 6th in terms of global connectivity in the world city network, with an emphasis on advanced producer services, behind London, New York, Hong Kong, Paris and Singapore. Sydney is now classified as an Alpha+ city along with Tokyo, Beijing and Shanghai.
The Mercer Index ranks Sydney in the top 10 global cities by quality of life. The Mastercard Index of Commerce ranks Sydney as the 12th most significant Worldwide Center of Commerce.
The Anholt City Brand Index rates Sydney as the top city in the world with the strongest brand strength, ahead of London, Paris, New York and Rome of 40 cities worldwide.
The City in a National Context
Based on industry-mix and relative occupational wage levels, it is estimated that Economic Activity (GDP) generated in the City of Sydney in 2007-2008 was approximately $80 billion.
This represents 8% (nearly one-twelfth) of the total national Australian economy, over 30% of the Sydney metropolitan area and almost one-quarter of the GDP of the entire state of NSW.
The City of Sydney is also Australia’s iconic face to the world - its international visitor flag-bearer, boasting seven of the top ten most popular international visitor attractions. Half of all international visitors come to Sydney and two-thirds of international business visitors.
The consequence is that the City is the prime driver of both the Australian and NSW economy.
There are approximately 20,000 separate business establishments in the City of Sydney. One-in-twelve of the employees of all businesses in Australia with over 200 employees work in the City. The City is the location of almost 40% of the headquarters of the top 500 Australian corporations and almost half of the regional headquarters of multi-national corporations in Australia.
Overall the City has a working population which is just over 4% of the Australian total workforce. However, it is the workplace to 20% of the entire Australian finance sector; 13% of the Australian total Information, Media and Technology industry sector workforce; and 11% of national employment in Creative and Performing Arts activity. This proportion is even greater in more specific industries, such as Internet Publishing and Broadcasting (44%).
The City in a Metropolitan Context
The City of Sydney is currently home to 177,000 people (June 2009). This is an increase of nearly 10,000 (6%) from the last Population Census in just 2006. This has followed on from a total of 128,000 in 2001. In less than a decade the residential population has increased by 49,000 (38%).
Following on from a strong domination of employment growth within Sydney, the City of Sydney absorbed approximately 20% of the entire Sydney metropolitan residential growth in the period 2001-2006. The increase in the City’s population was the largest increase of a Local Government area in the Metropolitan area, and double the population increase of the second and third fastest growing local government areas – Blacktown and Baulkham Hills – combined.
The population is forecast to increase to 187,000 by the next ABS census in 2011 and to a total of approximately 243,000 by 2030.
Overall the City has just under 20% of the employment of the Sydney metropolitan area. However, it accounts for more than 35% of the metropolitan employment in the broadly-defined Creative industries. In particular, the City has over half of Sydney-wide employment in the industries of Performing Arts Venues; Services to the Arts; Newspaper Publishing; and Film and Video Distribution.
Similarly, most ICT and Finance Industry employees within Sydney are located within the City of Sydney. 41% of Information, Media and Telecommunications, and a massive 58% of Finance Industry workers in Sydney are located in the City.
Over the last decade, in economic terms, the City of Sydney has recorded economic growth in value added averaging 4.2%, led by the finance sector. This averages 0.85% higher than the Australian average. Conversely, the onset of the Global Financial Crisis has impacted hardest on the city with a decline of 1.6% over the latter half of calendar year 2008, with the City growth trailing the rest of Australia in each of the last 5 quarters.
The Built Form of the City
Given its location as the economic and cultural heart of the Sydney metropolitan area, the City of Sydney is highly and densely urbanised. Its land is intensively used for a variety of purposes including residential and commercial use as well as tourist and cultural attractions, and parks and open space. Indeed, it is home to the highest commercial and residential densities in Australia. This intensity of land-use very much determines its built form.
Given its density, approximately half of all floor space in the City of Sydney is used for commercial purposes, devoted to financial, retail, tourism, entertainment and other business services. The remainder is utilised for residential and other non-commercial uses, such as common area.
The 2006 total floorspace in the local government area for all uses is in excess of 32 million square metres.
There are over 17.5 million square metres of built form within the Central Business District (CBD) of the City and Ultimo-Pyrmont. Over 5.4 million square metres of internal floor area is devoted to office uses. This is the largest CBD office market in Australia and within the top 20 world-wide.
Strong tenant growth in the period between July 2004 and January 2008 saw net demand for office space grow by approximately 500,000 square metres or nearly double the long-term trend in office space absorption. This saw the vacancy rate fall to 3.7%. Despite the onset of the global economic recession, the demand for space has held up resiliently such that the latest vacancy rate remains at 5.4%. This is in contrast to vacancy rates of 15-20% in other recessions that the City has faced in the last 30 years.
A Community of Diversity
The Australian Bureau of Statistics Census of 2006 reveals that the City of Sydney comprises a diverse ethnic mix with half of its residents born overseas. Over 30% of the resident population speaks a language other than English. Apart from English, the most common languages spoken at home are Chinese, Indonesian, Korean and Greek. The City is home to one of Sydney’s largest communities of Aboriginal peoples.
The median age of the City resident is 32 years of age, a full 3 years less than the average of the rest of Sydney.
The 2006 Census indicated that almost half of city residents are aged between 18 and 34. Most significantly, two-thirds of the population increase in the last 5 years has occurred in this age group. Conversely, there are fewer teenagers, children and older people residing in the City of Sydney than in the Sydney metropolitan area.
The influx of young adult residents into the City of Sydney is reflected in the growing number of single people living here. More than 60% of City residents aged 15 and over that have never married, compared with one-third in the Sydney Metropolitan area.
Just less than a quarter of city residents live alone in one-person households. This compares to less than 10% Sydney-wide. However, the majority (60%) of city residents live in family households with a partner and/or children or other relatives. Group households accommodate just under one-in-five.
Over a quarter of City residents are currently attending an educational institution, including just under one in five of those aged 15 and over undertaking a post-school course. There are 19,886 residents attending either a TAFE or University with over 12,400 on a full-time basis.
On average, individual residents in the City earn more than their counterparts in the Sydney Metropolitan Area ($717 per week median compared to $558). A quarter of residents aged 15 or more have a weekly income of over $1300 a week. Conversely, another quarter receive less than $250 per week.
One-third of the City resident households either own or are paying off their dwelling. Of the remaining two-thirds who rent, the vast majority rent from the private sector. These represent over half (52%) of all resident households. However, a significant further 11% are public and community housing tenants, although this is less than the 14% housing share registered five years previously.
60% of households in the City of Sydney own a car, compared to more than 85% for the Sydney metropolitan area. The average number of cars per household is only 0.8 compared to 1.5 for the Sydney metropolitan area.
Over a quarter of City of Sydney residents walk to work (27%), compared to only 4% for the Sydney metropolitan area. Only marginally more (28%) drive a car to work. This is less than the proportion that use public transport (31%).
In the five years since the previous Census in 2001, the number of walk-to-workers increased by 27% and those bicycling by almost a quarter (24.3%). Despite making up less than 5% of all Sydney metropolitan residents, City residents comprised a quarter (24%) of all those in Sydney who walk to work and one-eighth (12.5%) of those who ride a bike to work.
Workforce of the City of Sydney
It is estimated that employment for the current City of Sydney LGA totalled approximately 385,000, including 300,000 within the CBD and Pyrmont-Ultimo alone. This represents an increase of 16% in the last decade. Within the CBD and Pyrmont-Ultimo area alone, the workforce has increased by 100,000 or 50% since 1991.
Since 2005, in the CBD of the City, occupied office space has expanded by over 450,000 square metres, the equivalent of approximately 22,500 workers. Since 2005, the office vacancy rate has fallen from in excess of 11% to a low of 3.7% (January 2008). However, it has since risen to 5.4% (January 2009) with demand for office space shrinking by 40,000 square metres in the six months from July to December 2008, according to the Property Council of Australia.
Over one-third (35%) of the City’s workforce is in a Professional occupation with a further 17% employed as a Manager. The proportion of skilled workers has increased significantly in the last decade.
More than 40% of the City workforce was born overseas, with 40% of these overseas born workers coming from Asia, and 12.5% from China alone. A further 17% and 9% were born in the UK and New Zealand respectively.
The median average income of the City workforce is $1085 per week, or an annual income of $56,570. Nearly one-fifth (18%) of the workforce has an income of more than $2,000 per week and a further fifth receives between $1,300 and $2,000 per week.
Visitors to the City of Sydney
In the year to June 2008, over 2.6 million international visitors came to the Sydney Metropolitan area. This represented more than half of all international visitors to Australia. With 60% of all hotel rooms in Sydney Tourism Region, the City played nightly host, on average, to 26,000 accommodation visitors, which equates to 9.5 million guest nights in financial year 2007-2008.
In the year to December 2008, annual room nights occupied in the City of Sydney totalled an annual 5.8 million. The annual room occupancy rate has remained above 75% for over five years and above 80% since the year ended March 2007.
Despite global uncertainty, this overall room night demand has remained stable for the last two years. Strong growth from visitors from China, India and Malaysia has countered a slowing from traditional international markets. 2006 represented the first year where total takings from accommodation in the City of Sydney exceeded $1 billion. By the year ended June 2008, these annual takings had risen to $1.2 billion.
In addition to these overnight visitors in hotels and service apartments and city residents, it is estimated that a further 483,000 people travel to the City on any day to shop, be educated, conduct business with firms in the City or simply to be entertained. This is additional to the 385,000 daily workforce in the City.
When these workforce and visitor numbers are added to residents and hotel guests then it can be seen that each day the City attracts over one million people to its area. That represents almost a quarter of the Sydney metropolitan population, every day.
