Climate of Sydney

Sydney has an oceanic climate with warm summers and cool winters, with rainfall spread throughout the year. The weather is moderated by proximity to the ocean, and more extreme temperatures are recorded in the inland western suburbs. The warmest month is January, with an average air temperature range on the coast of 18.6 °C-25.8 °C and an average of 14.6 days a year over 30 °C. The maximum recorded temperature was 45.3 °C on 1939-01-14 at the end of a 4 day nationwide heat wave.

The winter is mildly cool, with temperatures rarely dropping below 5 °C in coastal areas. The coldest month is July, with an average range of 8.0 °C-16.2 °C. The lowest recorded minimum was 2.1 °C. Rainfall is fairly evenly divided between summer and winter, but is slight higher during the first half of the year, when easterly winds dominate. The average annual rainfall, with moderate to low variability, is 1217.0 mm, falling on an average 138.0 days a year. Snowfall last occurred in the Sydney City area in the 1830’s.

Although the city does not suffer from cyclones or significant earthquakes, the El Nino Southern Oscillation plays an important role in determining Sydney’s weather patterns: drought and bushfire on the one hand, and storms and flooding on the other, associated with the opposite phases of the oscillation. Many areas of the city bordering bushland have experienced bushfires, notably in 1994 and 2002 - these tend to occur during the spring and summer. The city is subject to infrequent severe hail storms and wind storms.

Geography of Sydney

Sydney is located in a coastal basin between the Pacific Ocean to the east and the Blue Mountains to the west. The city features the largest natural harbour in the world, Port Jackson, and more than 70 harbour and ocean beaches, including the famous Bondi Beach. Sydney’s urban area of 1687 km² (651 mi²) is similar to that of Greater London. The metropolitan area (Sydney Statistical Division) is 12 145 km² (4,689 mi²); a significant portion of this area is national park and other unsettled land.

Sydney occupies two geographical regions: the Cumberland Plain, a relatively flat or rolling region lying to the south and west of the harbour, and the Hornsby Plateau, a plateau north of the harbour, up to 200 metres (656 ft) in elevation, dissected by forested valleys. The oldest parts of the city are located in the flat areas; the Hornsby Plateau, known as the North Shore, was slower to develop because of its hilly topography, and was mostly a quiet backwater until the Sydney Harbour Bridge was opened in 1932, linking it to the rest of the city.

Sydney has three major openings to the sea. They are Broken Bay to the north, Port Jackson or Sydney Harbor in the center , and Botany Bay to the South.
Australia, the world’s smallest continent but sixth-largest country is situated between the Indian Ocean and the South Pacific Ocean.

History of Sydney

The Sydney region has been occupied by Indigenous Australians for at least 30 000 years, and at the time of the arrival of the First Fleet in 1788, 4000 - 8000 Aboriginal people lived in the region. There were three different language groups in the Sydney region, these were further refined into dialects spoken by smaller clans. The principal languages were Darug; the Cadigal, the original inhabitants of the City of Sydney, spoke a coastal dialect of Darug; Dharawal and Guringai. Each clan had a territory, the location of that territory determined the resources available. Although urbanisation has destroyed most evidence of these settlements (such as shell middens), there are still rock carvings in several locations.

European interest in Australia arose with the sighting of Botany Bay by Lieutenant James Cook in 1770. Under instruction from the British government, a convict settlement was founded by Arthur Phillip in 1788. Phillip founded the colony at Sydney Cove on Port Jackson. He named it after the British Home Secretary, Thomas Townshend, Lord Sydney, in recognition of Sydney’s role in issuing the charter authorising Phillip to establish a colony. In April 1789 a disease, thought to be smallpox decimated the Indigenous population of Sydney; a conservative estimate says that 500 to 1000 Aboriginal people died in the area between Broken and Botany Bay affecting Kuringgai and Darug. There was violent resistance to British settlement, notably by the warrior Pemulwuy in the area around Botany Bay, and conflicts were common in the area surrounding the Hawkesbury River. By 1820 there were only a few hundred Aborigines and Governor Macquarie had begun initiatives to ‘civilise, christianise and educate’ the Aborigines by removing them from their clans.

Macquarie ’s tenure as Governor of New South Wales was a period when Sydney was improved from its basic beginnings. Roads, bridges, wharves and public buildings were constructed by convicts, and by 1822 the town had banks, markets, well-established thoroughfares and an organised constabulary. The 1830s and 1840s were periods of urban development, including the development of the first suburbs, as the town grew rapidly when ships began arriving from Britain and Ireland with immigrants looking to start a new life in a new country. The first of several gold rushes started in 1851, and the port of Sydney has since seen many waves of people arriving from around the world. Rapid suburban development began in the last quarter of the 19th century with the advent of steam powered tramways and railways. With industrialisation Sydney expanded rapidly, and by the early 20th century it had a population well in excess of one million. The Great Depression hit Sydney badly. One of the highlights of the Depression Era however, was the completion of the Sydney Harbour Bridge in 1932.

Throughout the 20th century Sydney continued to expand with various new waves of European and (later) Asian immigration, resulting in its highly cosmopolitan atmosphere. Indeed, Sydney has the second highest immigrant population of any major world city, with 43% of the population being either migrants or children of migrants.[5] The majority of Sydneysiders are of British and Irish background. More recent arrivals have included Italians, Greeks, Jews, Lebanese, South Africans, South Asians (including Indians, Sri Lankans and Pakistanis), Sudanese, Turks, Macedonians, Croatians, Serbs, South Americans (Brazilians, Chileans and Argentinians), Armenians, Eastern Europeans (Czech, Poles, Russians, Ukrainians and Hungarians) and East Asians (including Chinese, Koreans and Vietnamese).

European settlement
European interest arose with the sighting of Botany Bay (now a southern suburb of Sydney) in 1770 by Captain James Cook. Under instruction from the British government, a settlement was founded by Arthur Phillip in 1788. (See First Fleet). Phillip originally landed at Botany Bay, but found it unsatisfactory. After a brief sail north, Phillip landed at Sydney Cove on Port Jackson (the proper name for Sydney Harbour).

Phillip originally named the colony “New Albion”, but for some uncertain reason the colony acquired the name “Sydney”, after the (then) British Home Secretary, Thomas Townshend, Lord Sydney (Baron Sydney, Viscount Sydney from 1789). This is possibly due to the fact that Lord Sydney issued the charter authorising Phillip to establish a colony.
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Introducation of Sydney

Sydney (pronounced /’s?d.ni?/) is the state capital of New South Wales, located on the east coast of Australia. The city was established in 1788 when Arthur Phillip and the First Fleet landed in Sydney Cove and claimed Australia for the British. With a metropolitan population of over 4 million people, it is the most populous city in the country (with about 20% of the total population).

Built around Sydney Harbour, which is sometimes considered one of the most beautiful harbours in the world[1], Sydney is known in Australia as the “Harbour City” and the harbour itself as well as structures on its shores such as the Sydney Opera House and the Sydney Harbour Bridge are globally recognised icons of the city. Sydney is a major domestic and international tourist destination, notable for its climate, famous beaches, culture, renowned landmarks and modern architecture. It is Australia’s main financial centre, and the skyscrapers of its financial district cluster around Circular Quay, making the city’s skyline one of the most distinctive in the world.

Sydney significantly raised its global profile in recent years as the host city of the 2000 Olympics. It is a “Beta” global city exerting significant regional, national, and international influence. From its sordid beginnings as a British penal colony in 1788, Sydney rapidly flourished, establishing booming trade links and witnessing large-scale development throughout the 19th and 20th centuries. The Sydney Opera House (a feat of avant-garde architectural vision) epitomizes the city’s desire to lead the New World in the 21st century. Sydney’s architecture is a stunning melange, with little Victorian structures nestling below towering concrete, steel and glass skyscrapers.

All the exuberance and plate-glass sophistication nonetheless fail to compensate for a certain competitive edginess in the city’s psyche. After the Australian Federation was created in 1901, the traditional bickering between Sydney and its arch rival, Melbourne, was settled in 1908, by making Canberra the new national capital. However, until 1927, when the city of Canberra was completed, Melbourne remained the seat of national government. Nevertheless, Sydneysiders insist that their city remains the ‘true’ capital of Australia and indeed, with a triumphant hosting of the 2000 Olympic Games, the world might even agree with this. But the rivalry with Melbourne persists - a rivalry based more on style than on stature for, while Sydney is decidedly Anglo in its ethnic orientation, Melbourne is more continental, with a much more tangibly imported culture. To Melbourne, Sydney will always be hedonistic and shallow, just as to Sydney, Melbourne will always be grey and intellectual.

Australia’s white history has eclipsed its indigenous inheritance and, although Sydney has the highest Aboriginal population of any Australian city, a stroll around the city’s streets offers little evidence that it has anything other than a white (and latterly, an Asian) heritage. While museums, galleries, theater and dance troupes pay tribute to the archaeological and cultural legacy of indigenous culture, Aborigines in the city remain very much an invisible minority.
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