Sydney is Australia’s largest vortex city, sucking in resources for production and consumption and using other parts of the planet to assimilate wastes. This paper analyses the strengths and weaknesses of competing definitions and measuring techniques to identify sustainable cities.

This paper will use a metaphor based on the ecological definition of the “ecotone” to examine the transition zones that occur around the edges of three of Sydney’s major parklands – Centennial Parklands (CP), the Sydney Olympic Parklands (SOP) and the Western Sydney Parklands (WSP).

The paper analyses the forces that have led to the NSW government’s creation of another urban development corporation in Sydney, the Redfern-Waterloo Authority.

The paper considers the how the water issue has been handled by the press in terms of framing, sensationalism, use of language and examples of press campaigning.

This paper presents a case study for Sydney involving the evaluation of likely impacts of transport policies aimed at mitigating the environmental impacts of urban freight transport.