Sydney is Australia's largest and most cosmopolitan city, the capital of New South Wales and the most heavily populated state in Australia. Sydney's population is over 4 million.
Kings Cross is the most densely populated area within Sydney (and Australia) according to the 1996 Census. More people live within 5 Kms. of the General
Post Office than anywhere else in Australia (ie. 283,844 in June 1999).
One of Sydney's most famous icons is the Sydney Harbour Bridge (1932), which took 10 years to build and links the city with the northern suburbs. The Bridge is 1,149 metres long in total, including the approach spans. 95,000 cubic metres of concrete, eight million rivets and 272,000 litres of paint were used.
The Bridge is painted grey as it was the only colour available at the time. The sandstone pylons are there to make the Bridge look safe, without performing any structural function. It took almost 70 years before the Sydney Harbour Bridge was opened to the public to climb. The first group of climbers was escorted to the summit on
October 1, 1998.
The 305 metre high AMP Tower at Centrepoint is Sydney's tallest building. The Tower is stabilised by 56 cables which, if laid end to end, would reach from Sydney to New Zealand. It takes approximately 40 seconds to travel by lift/elevator from the top to the bottom of the Tower. The Tower stands out over the Olympic period with three giant Olympic statues, representing the "power and excitement of the Games", created by young Australian artist Dominique Sutton. The design, in welded steel weighing four and a half tons and up to 12 metres high, includes a sprinter, a gymnast and a Paralympic basketballer.
The AMP Tower has one million dollars worth of fire protection equipment, countless sprinklers and a 162,000-litre water tank, which is the primary dampening system. The safety standards of the building exceed normal building requirements and the AMP Tower has been ranked as one of the safest buildings in the world.
Another Sydney icon, the Sydney Opera House, has over one million tiles on its roof. The original tiles came from Sweden but are now sourced from an Australian manufacturer. The SOH has almost completed a project to replace approximately 8,500 edge tiles as part of its ongoing maintenance program. The Sydney Opera House also contains 6,225 square metres of glass and 645 Kilometers of electric cable.
The Sydney Opera House is one of the busiest performing arts centres in the world, with 2,300 performances annually (compared to the Kennedy Centre (USA) which has 3,000 performances annually. There are five main performance venues, namely the Concert Hall, Opera Theatre, The Studio, Playhouse and Drama Theatre, plus external areas such as the Forecourt and the Monumental Steps which are also used for performances. The first performance at the Sydney Opera House was the Australian Opera's production of Prokofiev's War and Peace on 28 September 1973.
The grand organ in the Sydney Opera House is recognised as the world's largest mechanical action organ; it has 10,000 pipes grouped in 200 ranks, and is positioned 10 metres above the floor of the Concert Hall. It has five manual keyboards and 61 keys.
Sydney has set a new Olympic record by completing all the venues at the main Games precinct at Homebush Bay some nine months before the start of the 2000
Games. The Olympic Stadium at Sydney Olympic Park (Homebush) is the world's largest Olympic stadium, able to seat 110,000 people.
Sydney is one of the world's most culturally diverse cities. Nearly 42 per cent of all arriving migrants choose to settle in New South Wales and in particular Sydney. Migrants from 215 countries live in Sydney. More than one third of Sydney's population was born overseas and almost one third speaks languages other than English.
In 1999, 7.4 million international passengers arrived or departed from Australia through Sydney Airport and it is estimated that this figure will exceed 8 million this year.
The Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras celebrated its 22nd year in 2000.
The Mardi Gras Parade is Australia's largest and the three-week long Festival and post-Parade party is the world's largest gay and lesbian celebration.
In February 2000, the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras Parade was watched by more than one million viewers worldwide and in a world first, was broadcast on three different media simultaneously - cable and network television plus beamed live over the Internet.
Bondi Beach is Australia's most famous beach and a classic example of Sydney's beach culture. The beach is nearly a Kilometer long (950 metres) and is home to two of Australia's oldest surf clubs - Bondi Surf Bathers' Club (founded 1904) and the North Bondi Surf Club (1907). Each year about 3,000 people are rescued on the beach, most of them after they've been caught in a rip current.
