In Sydney, one group above all pays the price for selfish NIMBYism

July 1, 2026 — 3:30pm

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The 10-year-olds who first stood before Woollahra Council with petitions for a place to skate are now adults. The girls who might have learnt to shoot hoops will, by the time the facility opens this spring, have nothing but a childhood spent waiting. Thirteen years of planning, deferral and review have passed since the need for the Rushcutters Bay youth recreation area was first identified – long enough for an entire cohort to age out of the very space designed for them.

It is worth being precise about what the objection has been: the Darling Point Society’s president, Robert Pompei, argued in a submission opposing the youth area that it “destroys the historic open green space landscaping principle” of the park, and went further to “highly question the necessity of this facility”.

When the proposal surfaced, the then-member for Wentworth, Malcolm Turnbull, objected that “adding hard surfaces and concrete structures is not sympathetic to how the park is currently used”, raising noise concerns and noting that Bondi (an hour’s walk away)........

© The Sydney Morning Herald