gere

Hi there

I am looking for safe (crime free) area in Sydney (or greater Sydney area). We plan to live in Sydney in the future, could you please advise me on the areas (suburbs) in Sydney (or greater Sydney area) to avoid.

Gere

Dougie

Dont think you will ever find anywhere Crime Free i,m afraid !


Dougie

gere

Could someone recommend a safe area of Sydney (or even greater Sydney). I do not mind living 20 Km (or 40 kms) from the city.

Bubsblooms

Hi there, I can make some suggestions of where definately not to live......(I am sure there will be plenty who think differently but in my opinion )
Redfern (some very dodgy bits)
Campbelltown
Maroubra (gorgeous beaches and nice suburbs but not nice people go into Maroubra and there is troubles from them..)
Just outside of Penrith which itself is OK - so for example St. Marys and surrounds.
Blacktown
Most suburbs, like the UK, have their good and bad. Sydney is very much on a par with London but without so much gun crime! The different suburbs often have really swanky new bits that attract the monied city workers but just up the road is a section of Housing Commission which can in turn be abit rough. Crime exists as it does here, get off a train in Bondi and you might be mugged - but Bondi is a "nice" suburb...
Realistically you have to go and get a feel for somewhere - we lived in Newtown which is very central, full of drunken homeless people and burglaries left, right and centre, bars on the house windows etc etc but we witnessed nothing at all for the 15 months we were there
I will watch this thread with interest!!!!!

gere

Thanks Bubsblooms.

I hope this thread will get more contributions from people on British Expats.

JRB

I don't really know Sydney that well but have visited about 4-5 times. Generally I think the Western suburbs of Sydney were not always the best but I am not sure what particular ones. I think as previous people have said though that all areas have crime unfortunately. I think the best areas are the Northern beaches and the East of the City.

Kooky.

Nowhere is 100% safe or crime free; some areas are obviously a lot worse than others. There is a lot of information on the site about Sydney suburbs - do a search and you should find it.

Syedney

Hey mate!

When I first came here in June as part of reccie, I was told this by practically everyone here (including people who live in the areas I am about to mention!!)

If you have a family:
Avoid : South and West Sydney.
Aim for : Northern Beaches (Areas like Dee Why, Curl curl etc..)

If you're single:
Avoid : Northern beaches (full of families!)
Aim for : Surry Hills, Kings Cross and Bondi !!


Hope this helps as it helped me

man_called_Horse

There is always crime everywhere but if you intend to move to Sydney that would be the least of your worries, I would be thinking of

1. What suburbs is affordable?
2. What suburbs are close to work?
3. What is public transport like?
4. What the traffic is like in these areas?
5. What amenities are available in the area?

MrCro

my uncle lives in Berowra Heights (upper north shore) and they still leave front door open, cars unlocked and even his van and garage open which are full of power tools etc!!!

freaks me out when there as just cannot get into that mindset that you can leave things unlocked!!

ABCDiamond

The Erskine Park/St Clair area of Western Sydney is reasonably OK. About 1 hour by train to Sydney CBD.

The Mount Druitt area, where the Train Station (for the above) is, was not classed as very desirable, but when I left it was beginning to change, with new houses replacing many of the older ones.

Even though it had a bad reputation, we felt it OK for our daughter to go to school there. It was in the late evenings that I feel it deserved its old reputation.

The difficulty is that you can get good and bad areas in one suburb, so it makes it difficult to know for sure.

jellab

I lived in Burwood for 2 years from 96-98. My sister also lived there for 7 years up until 2004. Nothing much happened there while we were there. It was a quiet suburb It has a good transport system to the city.
I am sure other people will have some more suburbs to recomend.
Good luck

medwaymark

Everyone seems to have a downer on Western Suburbs for some reason...we are South West Sydney & live in a really nice suburb with quite a few families. Not saying everywhere is perfect, but is a bit of a sweeping statement to avoid a huge area like that.....bit like saying Don't live in Kent it's horrible

(isn't that right ABCD lol)

MarkMC

LMAO

There have been loads of drive by shootings (they occasionally hit the wrong house too)and look at the cash machines... average 2 or 3 a night being blown off the wall. These criminals do not pick and choose the suburbs its happening all over.

ABCDiamond

Absolutely, some parts are a real dive! But some are very nice.

Actually Kent has a smaller population (1,650,000 inc Medway) than the Western Suburbs of Sydney.

That's almost half of Sydneys population that lives in the Western Suburbs.