Project Sydney: Childcare, hospitals needed to cope with 1.2m people population boom

SYDNEY’S population boom threatens to leave a severe shortage in childcare centres, hospitals and GPs as more than 1.2 million people squeeze into the city within 15 years.

• Sydney population growing faster than predicted
• Lucy Turnbull: Project Sydney — The future of this city is great

SYDNEY’S population boom threatens to leave a severe shortage in childcare centres, hospitals and GPs as more than 1.2 million people squeeze into the city within 15 years.

Exclusive modelling reveals the “shopping list” of social services needed to meet demand — more than half of it in Western Sydney.

Sydney will need 500 new childcare centres, 70 hospitals and 1750 GPs, according to the PwC research.

“We are building to accommodate the population of Adelaide­ in the next 20 years — it’s scary,” PwC chief economist Jeremy Thorpe said.

“Doing what we have always done is not going to continue to keep Sydney as a great city.”

Project Sydney: Enough is enough — let’s make Sydney a masterpiece

Sydney is going to be in dire need of more childcare centres as the city grows. Picture: Jason Edwards

Mr Thorpe said precincts where people could work, walk to school and have easy access to a hospital were key to making life liveable. For example, around Badgerys Creek aerotropolis is a “chance to build a city of the future”, he said.

In Western Sydney alone, the growing population will need 285 childcare centres, 40 hospitals and 1000 GPs, Mr Thorpe said.

Paul Fletcher Minister for Urban Infrastructure on the Western Sydney Airport Site at Badgerys Creek. Picture: Renee Nowytarger / The Australian

In the last Budget the state government pledged more than $1 billion in upgrades to Campbelltown, Nepean and Concord hospitals, $435 million on childcare and five rural GP training spots.

PwC also foreshadows that rapid population growth from 4.6 million to about six million in 2031 will put 700,000 more cars onto Sydney’s roads.

Infrastructure Minister Andrew Constance.

PwC economist Jeremy Thorpe.

“If we get to that and have not planned greater public transport then we have failed,” Mr Thorpe said.

The “avoidable social costs’’ of gridlock in Sydney are $6.1 billion, roughly $1000 for each resident this year, federal government­ estimates show. Those costs could double to $12 billion by 2030.

Infrastructure Minister Andrew Constance said: “Congestion-busting is the name of the game. It’s about getting home to your kids at night and getting to work on time. It’s about not spending a week of your life in a traffic jam.”

Project Sydney and the Bradfield Oration.

Mr Constance has a $41.5 billion budget to splurge on roads and public transport over the next four years, more than every other state and territory­ combined.

Sydney is still growing — with more homes being built, more people arriving here every day — and infrastructure will need to keep up.

“There isn’t a point in our history when we’ve invested like this and seen this degree of expenditure on roads and rail at the same time,’’ he said.

“This is one of the biggest, most ambitious infrastructure programs in the world and it is setting the city up for centuries to come.’’

Western Sydney will benefit from $3.6 billion in road and rail upgrades.