The Good Life

National: Urbanised areas especially the main cities Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane etc have higher wellbeing. However, these urbanised areas reduce the affordability of living resulting in pockets of condensed poverty and low wellbeing.

Areas of lower wellbeing include remote regions in northern Queensland and Western New South Wales. Central Australia generally has lower wellbeing compared to coastal and urban regions due to its remoteness such as Alice Springs.

State

Higher wellbeing in Eastern NSW where the coastal and metro regions of Sydney, South-east Coast, remote areas in the West have a lower wellbeing such as Dubbo, Orange, Western NSW. North and south NSW have a mixed wellbeing.

Sydney

Sydney has more spatial inequality than any other Australian city. Areas of poverty, unemployment, violence and social distress are now a feature of Sydney.

Sydney could be described as a 'divide' city with an affluent north and east and a less affluent south, west and south-west. This is shown clearly by the latte line

Locational advantage: the benefits or advantages that come from a particular location, such as access to resources, market proximity, or infrastructure

Locational disadvantage: geographic isolation from a range of goods and services

Woolloomooloo: a harbourside, inner-city eastern suburb of Sydney located in a low-lying, former docklands area in Sydney Harbour. It is 1.5km east of the CBD

Gentrification: the process where a poor, urban area is transformed by an influx of middle or wealth class individuals, improving housing, attracting business, and often displacing the original, poorer residents

Globalisation: involves the increasing integration of the economies and cultures of different countries. It occurs via the breakdown of traditional barriers between nation-states allowing the movement of goods, capital, people and information.

Urban decay: the sociological process by which a previously functioning city, or part of a city, falls into disrepair and decrepitude

Urban renewal: the redevelopment of areas within a large city, typically involving the clearance of slums

• The Finger Wharf and wharf terraces are a prime example of urban renewal

• Close proximity to the Central Business District

• Easy access to recreation and leisure  (Boy Charlton pool, Luna Park, Mrs Macquarie's Chair)

• Access to plentiful entertainment

• Great nightlife -> attraction for young professionals

• Good quality food access and culture

• Easy commute to work in the CBD

• Healthcare

• Luxurious water views and access to water

• Access to parks, public, spaces, and playgrounds (Botanical gardens. Hyde Park, The Domain)

• Close to significant places of worship

Disadvantages

• Lack of access to train station

• Noise from the Pacific Highway -> various types of pollution: light, sound, chemical, air

• Higher danger risk, lower safety due to closeness to Kings Cross -> drug-abused people

• Eastern suburbs railway line also adds to noise

• Car parking space is limited in the CBD -> public transport heavily used

• Hope Street: a community centre in Woolloomooloo working on case work, advocacy, counselling, pastoral support, referrals to other service providers

• They also have a community café and opportunity shop, and chaplains/volunteers who come to support others

• Matthew Talbot Hostel: shelter and support service provider for homeless men

• Provides access to hot meals, sanitary, clothing, medication, 98 beds, gym, art space, barbershop, kitchen

• Wayside Chapel: situated near Woolloomooloo in Kings Cross offering health, welfare, social and recreation services

• Individual response: volunteering at the Red Cross, food relief initiatives, age care and disabled facility

• Government response - WISH: Woolloomooloo Integrated Services Hub, takes place at the Wayside Chapel every third Wednesday of most months. Provides legal, social, family and transport advice and services.

Poverty, homelessness, financial inequality, Indigenous inequality

Poverty line: the estimated level of income needed to secure the necessities of life; this amount differs between countries

The minimum standard of living in Australia is known as the poverty line, which is 50% of median income

1. By determining how much income a person/household receives aka income inequality

2. By determining how much wealth is held by a person/household aka wealth inequality

Equality of opportunity: equal treatment of all people in a society, regardless of race, age, gender, religion or mental or physical disability

Social mobility: the movement of individuals, families or households between the various levels of class in Australia e.g from middle-class to upper middle-class

• The biggest cause of this disadvantages is through the British colonisation and their dispossession of the Aboriginal population - the forced relocation of Indigenous people from their traditional lands to missions and settlements

• Dispossession and marginalisation caused compounding social consequences as the Indigenous could no longer support themselves as they had traditionally done successfully for tens of thousands of years

• This resulted in dependence on government welfare, and were pushed into remote areas far removed from many of the services Australians take for granted

• Redistributing income via the tax system from high-paid to low-paid Australians

• Increasing government spending on health care, education, housing and public transport

• Ensuring that young people are better educated and therefore better able to fill the jobs being created in the new information-based economy

• Retraining those who have been marginalised and demoralised by the decline in manufacturing employment