Since the mid 1980s the character of residential development on Sydney’s urban fringe has become increasingly socially and economically differentiated from older more established outer ring suburbs. Greenfield developments are no longer characterised by low income residents, and less affluent first home-buyers fulfilling their ‘Australian dream’. Rather, contemporary housing development is being undertaken through the ‘master planned community’ that is catering for upwardly mobile groups of middle and higher income earners seeking to protect their social and economic assets. The ‘community’ this form of development creates effectively differentiates these places of residence from the lower prestige and socially disadvantaged areas of Sydney’s western suburbs.

The purpose of this paper is two fold. In the first instance it considers aspects of demographic change and socio-spatial restructuring in south-west Sydney over the past decade. Secondly, it draws on the findings of qualitative case studies of two contemporary greenfield residential developments on Sydney’s south-west fringe, to investigate the capacity of master-planning to effect socio-economic differentiation.