THE little pockets of bush that sustained the likes of me in childhood are fast disappearing. We made cubbies, walked dogs, caught tadpoles, hatched frogs and cicadas, collected fossils, climbed trees, dug holes, built bike jumps.
They were not glamorous. A chunk of scrub at the edge of a football field in Broadmeadow. Gone. A bunch of lantana choking a creek in Adamstown. Gone. A tract of bush at the eastern edge of Kotara. Gone. Bush up the back of the neighbours' house in Garden Suburb. Gone. Near the railway tracks at high school. Gone.
They were everything to us. And they are - those that remain - everything, to someone. Where have they gone? What else is going? What have we learned? We know better than to keep producing never-ending cookie-cutter style suburbs with no established trees, no meaningful green spaces, nowhere for kids to go, nothing to do, and not a thought for integrated community spaces that bring people together, that bring people together with nature, which offer 'built in' opportunities, incentive, to get outside. Meet a neighbour.
Elsewhere, communities go to great lengths to hold on to what little is left. In Japan, ageing trees with limbs at risk of breaking or falling off are cradled, held up, fenced off, and adored.
Here we are seemingly happy to push the limits of our environment to the edge and beyond, while researchers pump out paper after paper highlighting the importance of green space and exercise to salve the community's growing open wounds of loneliness, obesity, depression, anxiety, addictions - the unwellness of not moving, not connecting to nature, not connecting with others, and not connecting to ourselves. The importance of community - knowing your neighbours.
Developers will say they are following the rules, the rule-makers will say they are trying to strike a balance - neither, it seems, go far enough. They lag, as is customary, and yet increasingly unacceptable, way behind what the community wants, what the community needs, what our kids are crying out for - what we grieve, and what we crave. And it's not news. None of it's new. And the research keeps coming.
Yes, we need more affordable, accessible housing. But does it have to be at the cost of the very little green space we have left in our urban environment?
