Exploring the Complexities of Western Sydney’s Identity

What is Western Sydney? A region? A set of tribes? A disparate collection of communities?

What is Western Sydney? Few understand its complexity, geography, economy, demography, social profiles, cultures, or history.

It is a complex demographic area with a high degree of diversity among communities and ethnic and cultural groups.

The area was an important part of the foundation of a colonial settler society in NSW for the British Empire, based loosely on the Cumberland Plain.

Ed Husic, the Federal Member for Chifley, which includes Blacktown, said that Parramatta is the Eastern Suburbs of Western Sydney. Husic invited those who live in the east of Sydney to come out and see how complex the area is. (Interview, Ed Husic with Hamish Macdonald, ABC Radio 702, 8 December 2025)

So why is Western Sydney so misunderstood?

What’s in a line?

 Sydney Morning Herald Parramatta bureau journalist, Mostafa Rachwani, recently examined the question of what Western Sydney is.

Rachwani asked, Where do you put the line? His conclusion,

It’s a question that has perplexed Sydneysiders for generations, and could have endless answers based on who is asked.(SMH, 13 October 2025)

Is Western Sydney a real region? 

What does AI say about Western Sydney? The response was

Yes, Western Sydney is a real and officially recognised region, though its exact boundaries can vary slightly depending on the specific government or planning context. It is a major area within the metropolitan area of Greater Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. 

Key Details

• Official Recognition: Western Sydney is widely recognized as a distinct region by all three levels of Australian government (Commonwealth, State, and Local) for planning, investment, and policy purposes.
• Governmental Structure: The region has a number of cooperative bodies, such as the Western Sydney Regional Organisation of Councils (WSROC), which represent the interests of the various local government areas (LGAs) that fall within it.
• Population and Economy: It is one of Australia’s most dynamic and fastest-growing areas, home to almost half of Sydney’s residents and comprising the third-largest economy in Australia (behind Sydney CBD and Melbourne).
• Diversity and Identity: The region is known for its rich multiculturalism, with residents from over 170 countries. This diversity contributes to a strong regional identity, which some residents proudly embrace despite historical socio-economic stereotypes.
• Physical Area: It generally encompasses the metropolitan areas west of the Inner West region, stretching from areas like Parramatta A in the east to the foothills of the Blue Mountains in the west, and from Windsor in the north to Campbelltown and Camden in the south.

In short, it’s far more than just a collection of suburbs; it is a significant, defined, and rapidly developing part of the Greater Sydney metropolis. (AI Generated)

Sydney’s Latte Line

Other measures have been used to delineate the boundary between western Sydney and the rest of Sydney based on various factors.

One idea put forward was a ‘latte line’.

The exact origin of the phrase itself is difficult to pinpoint, but it emerged in public discourse as a colloquial way for urban planners, economists, and the media to describe an existing, quantifiable disparity in Sydney’s urban landscape. The name derives from the perception that “latte-sipping” professionals (white-collar workers) generally reside in the affluent areas above the line, while the areas below are home to more blue-collar workers, and have fewer cafes serving such items.

Sydney’s Latte Line has been used as a metaphor to divide Western Sydney from the rest of the metropolitan area.

  

The economic commissioner of the Greater Sydney Commission, Geoff Roberts said

We talk about the Latte Line. If you are north of that line you are largely a ‘have’. If you are south of that line, you are largely a ‘have-not.

It’s a concept that says employment, education levels, social disadvantage, all the things that make a city less productive and less liveable than what we would all desire, you can pretty much draw a line from the airport through Parramatta, just to the west of Parramatta up to the north-west sector. (Saulwick 2016)

The socio-economic division of Sydney into ‘haves’ and ‘have-nots’ is not new. Sydney’s better off -Silvertail – regions include  ‘The Shire’ or Sutherland Shire, The North Shore, The Northern Beaches, The Eastern Suburbs and The Hills Area. When taken together, they form the northeastern half of the Sydney metro area. You can draw an imaginary line running from Sydney northwest to the southwest. Anything on the eastern side of this line is not western Sydney.

Other socio-economic indicators reinforce these divisions within Sydney.

The “Red Rooster Line”, coined back around 2016 by a Twitter user named Big Jez before being mentioned by the University of Sydney’s student newspaper Honi Soit is an observation that outlets of the fast-food chain Red Rooster in Sydney appear to not cross an imaginary line dividing the city into two, the relatively more affluent North and East and the less affluent South and West. (Turner, R. (2025)

Johnstone writes:

Since being coined by Twitter user Big Jez in 2016, the ‘Red Rooster Line’ has served as a tongue-in-cheek cartography of taste, using quick-service chicken restaurants as a marker of where one resides in Sydney. (Johnstone 2025)

The University of Sydney student newspaper Honu Soit conducted an investigation in 2017 that found that the distribution of fast-food outlets can be used as an indicator of socioeconomic class in Sydney. The student newspaper found

sketch the points of all the Red Roosters in Sydney and you get a surprisingly neat indication of the border of Western Sydney.(Chrysanthos and Ding, 2017)

The location of the upmarket Harris Farm Markets reflects a market-driven view of Sydney’s upper classes, according to income, in eastern Sydney.

These economic characteristics provide some measure of authentic commonalities across Western Sydney, providing a basis for a regional identity. These have been reinforced by other demographic features.

HSC results further support this analysis. In a SMH survey, nearly 90 per cent of Sydney’s 55 highest-performing schools (shown in dark blue) are located either on or above the line. (Bagshaw & Ting 2016)

Sydney culture wars

The 2021 Covid lockdowns by the Berejiklian Coalition Government targeted 12 western Sydney LGAs and exaggerated the perceptions of the existing demographic features of western Sydney.

The Covid lockdowns have been accused of reinforcing these socio-economic divisions between east and west.

Journalists Jordan Baker and Matt Wade wrote

Sydney is the most unequal city in Australia, a divide once acknowledged in the open rivalry between ‘‘westy’’ fibros and north shore silvertails, but that no longer provokes as much public discussion. As income concentrates in the hands of the top 10 per cent, health, education and employment outcomes slide for many of those living on the wrong side of the so-called Latte Line, an imaginary divide running north-west from the airport that roughly cleaves the city on a host of economic and social indicators.

Professor Ian Hickie, co-director of health and policy at the University of Sydney’s Brain and Mind Centre was

concerned the division and resentment will linger well beyond the pandemic, deepening Sydney’s divisions and further marginalising those already at risk of alienation, such as refugee and Muslim communities. (Baker and Wade 2021).

The actions of the Berejiklian Government reinforced and exaggerated the existing demographic differences and were portrayed by some as the outbreak of a continuing culture war between the eastern and western parts of Sydney.

These characteristics were further reinforced by the 2005 Cronulla Riots, when different Sydney youth cultures clashed over turf wars. The National Museum of Australia has titled these events as ‘Westies invaded the turf of Cronulla Surfers’. (National Museum of Australia 2022).

Multiple Western Sydneys

A recent academic study by the University of Sydney’s Jodie Vo comes closer than most other efforts to define Western Sydney. (Vo 2025)

She states that there are ‘multiple Western Sydneys’ and they are significantly different.

She argues that Western Sydney is a ‘broad and undefined space’ associated with a range of factors, including culture, language, local industries, and high-level structural disadvantage.

Vo’s approach to the ‘many Western Sydneys’ was to classify them into three types,

• ‘Formal’: created by Australian local, state and federal governments for decision-making and to distribute resources, e.g. money, infrastructure.
• ‘Quasi-formal’: created by organisations which aim to promote ‘Western Sydney’ and influence decision-making.
• ‘Informal’: created by Greater Sydney residents from personal experiences. These are ‘cultural’ boundaries based on people’s ideas of what makes people, places and things what they are (Vo 2025)

 Vo’s ‘formal’ classification has been around for a while.

In the postwar period, the idea of a Western Sydney was a helpful tool created by urban planners to assist them with Sydney’s urban growth, loosely based on the Cumberland Plain.  

Bruce Baskerville notes that the term “Western Sydney” is relatively recent, first used by the Prospect County Council in 1961. It did not include the Macarthur LGAs of Campbelltown, Camden or Wollondilly.[8] (Baskerville 2014)

Two examples will suffice here to illustrate the administrative region. 

Firstly, the Ministry for Western Sydney is part of the New South Wales state government. It includes the 10 Western Sydney Regional Organisation of Councils (WSROC) and has added Camden, Campbelltown, Wollondilly and The Hills.

On the other hand, the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) definition based on labour force regions includes the 12 LGAs: Auburn, Blacktown, Blue Mountains, Camden, Campbelltown, Fairfield, Hawkesbury, Holroyd, Liverpool, Parramatta, Penrith and Wollondilly, while excluding Bankstown and The Hills, which are included in the state government’s definition.

Not everyone agrees with these ideas, and in 1996, a delegate at a local tourism forum stated that Sydney’s west is too large an area for unity to exist. (Camden Council 1996)

The University of Western Sydney considers that Greater Western Sydney constitutes an area bounded by Parramatta in the east, Campbelltown in the south, Blue Mountains and Penrith in the west and Windsor in the north, and it is a ‘rapidly developing, culturally diverse, peri-urban region.’ (WSU 2022).

Challenges

Is the West a thing?

Apart from being an administrative convenience, is Western Sydney an authentic functional region unified by commonalities and geographic networks?

Some businesses are challenging the Red Rooster line’s location and attempting to bend it by incursions into the ritzy parts of Sydney by chicken outlets from Sydney’s west. One is particular is Granville’s El Jannah dishing up a Lebanese cuisine with franchise outlets at Crow’s Nest, Lindfield and more recently Randwick and Brookvale on the Northern Beaches. (Johnstone 2025)

Where is the West? The West is a movable feast.

One notional boundary on the edge of Western Sydney is the rural-urban fringe. It is a demarcation line between urban and rural areas, and its location has changed over the decades.  

As Sydney’s urban area has grown, the boundary has moved westward from colonial times,  initially along the Parramatta River basin, then across the Cumberland Plain.

Today, the rural-urban frontier demarcates the peri-urban areas of Western Sydney, eg, Wollondilly Shire.

Western Suburbs Rugby League Team

Another example to illustrate the changing perception of what constitutes Western Sydney is the location of a rugby league team and its headquarters.

In 1908, the newly founded rugby league competition knew where Sydney’s western suburbs were located, and that was at Ashfield. The newly named Western Suburbs Rugby League Club was formed at a meeting at the Ashfield Town Hall. They were a foundation club of the Sydney Rugby League competition. These days, Ashfield is firmly located in the western suburbs of Sydney, with the club relocating to Campbelltown in 1987. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Suburbs_Magpies)

When the West was Sydney’s first economic powerhouse

What is now considered the heart of western Sydney, Parramatta, was an economic powerhouse in the earliest days of the colonial settlement.

In the first 20 years of the colony of New South Wales, the economic hub of the Sydney basin was not around the port of Sydney; it was at Parramatta.

The most important commercial area of Sydney was on the Cumberland Plain, not in its current location.   Historically, the Cumberland Plain has been the natural geographic area that constitutes Western Sydney, encompassing the Cumberland Woodland.

According to Elizabeth Ellis, the Cumberland Plain was the first part of the colony of New South Wales to be settled after the Europeans moved inland from Sydney Cove. In the early days of the colony, the population of Parramatta was larger than that of Sydney Town because of its poor soil and the farming at Parramatta. (Ellis, 2019) The population of Sydney Town did not exceed that of the western area until the mid-1820s, when Sydney became the colony’s commercial and administrative centre. (Robinson 1953)

A small group of privileged individuals, often army and naval officers, became the exclusives of the Cumberland Plain and included Blaxland, Macarthur, King, Macleay, Piper, and Wentworth.(Ellis, 2019)

Ellis argues that these powerful colonial elites, supported by marriage and paternalism, developed a structured economic network of colonial homesteads, with outstations, e.g., the Macarthur family centred on Elizabeth Farm at Parramatta, with outstations at Camden Park in the Cowpastures and Brownlow Hill.

In the Mulgoa area, there were Fernhill, Windborn, Hobartville, and Regentville.

Others included Raby, Leppington, Glenfield, Horsely, Annandale, Georges Hall, Lockwood, Werrington, Dunhevid, Veteran Hall, Greystanes, Bungaribee, Vineyard/Subiaco, Clovelly, and Newington.

Ellis maintains that this ‘bunyip aristocracy’ lasted until the 1840s depression, after which it never recovered. However, their legacy remains with us today in suburb names, road locations, and a host of other factors.

The rebirth of the West as an economic powerhouse

Sydney’s Cumberland Plain will again become an economic powerhouse with the development of the new airport called Western Sydney International (WSI) at Badgery’s Creek.

The new WSI could act as an economic hub.  WSI might be a catalyst for strengthening a sense of place.

 Economist Simon White maintains that economic growth can encourage a sense of place and strengthen community attachment. He argues that

Studies show significant correlation between community attachment and economic growth. Cities with the highest levels of attachment have the highest rate of economic growth. (Knight Foundation 2010; White 2020).

WSI has the potential to aid the unity of Western Sydney, when few other mechanisms have been successful to date, if you believe the hype.

Mr Roberts, from the Greater Sydney Commission, said that planning in 2016 was  ‘investing a lot of expectation in the Badgerys Creek airport’.  (Saulwick 2016).

According to Infrastructure Australia

 “The proposed airport has the potential to be a transformational infrastructure project for Western Sydney. Western Sydney is one of Australia’s fastest growing economies, and building Sydney’s second airport at Badgerys Creek will accelerate this growth. (Infrastructure Australia  2016).

Sydney Metro states

The Western Sydney Airport metro line is expected to become the backbone of transportation in Greater Western Sydney, connecting communities from St Marys to Bradfield, with the capacity to carry 7740 passengers per hour in each direction. (Sydney Metro 2024).

According to the NSW Government Planning, the new city of Bradfield, adjacent to WSI

The Western Sydney Aerotropolis will become a thriving economic centre in Western Sydney.  Benefiting from proximity to the new Western Sydney International (Nancy-Bird Walton) Airport, the Aerotropolis will contribute towards 200,000 new jobs in the broader Western Parkland City and become a high skill jobs hub across aerospace and defence, manufacturing, healthcare, freight and logistics, agribusiness, education and research industries. (Planning 2025)

A recent proposal would extend the Metro across the Cumberland Plain, with the Western Sydney International Airport as a central hub. (Segaert, A. 2025)

Western Sydney as an entertainment hub

Another question for AI: What are Western Sydney’s main tourist attractions? It generated this list:

Tourist attractions

Western Sydney offers a diverse mix of multicultural food hubs (Cabramatta, Parramatta), vast green spaces (Western Sydney Parklands, Botanic Gardens), wildlife encounters (Featherdale, Sydney Zoo), adrenaline-pumping activities (Penrith Whitewater, Raging Waters), history (Elizabeth Farm, Museum of Fire), and arts (Casula Powerhouse), catering to foodies, families, nature lovers, and adventurers alike. 

Nature & Outdoors

• Western Sydney Parklands: A huge green lung with picnic spots (Bungaribee, Blaxland Riverside), walking trails, and playgrounds.
• The Australian Botanic Garden (Mount Annan): Beautiful gardens with unique flora and walking paths.
• Auburn Botanic Gardens: Features unique plants and lovely seasonal festivals.
• Lake Parramatta Reserve: A great spot for recreation, swimming, and walking. 

Wildlife & Animals

• Featherdale Sydney Wildlife Park: Get up close with native Australian animals.
• Sydney Zoo: A modern zoo with wide-open enclosures.
• Calmsley Hill City Farm: Farmyard fun for the kids. 

Adventure & Thrills

• Penrith Whitewater Stadium: White-water rafting and kayaking.
• Raging Waters Sydney: Sydney’s biggest water theme park.
• Treetops Adventure (Abbotsbury): Aerial obstacle courses in the trees.
• Sydney Motorsport Park & Dragway: For motorsport enthusiasts. 

Culture, History & Arts

• Parramatta & Harris Park: Explore “Little India” with amazing South Asian food.
• Cabramatta: A vibrant hub for Vietnamese cuisine and culture.
• Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre: A contemporary art gallery and performance space.
• Elizabeth Farm (Rosehill): Australia’s oldest house, offering a glimpse into colonial life.
• Museums: Explore the Museum of Fire, NSW Rail Museum, or Fairfield Museum. 

Unique Experiences

• Balloon Aloft Camden: Sunrise hot air balloon rides.
• Sydney Olympic Park: Walk where the Olympics happened, with lots of open space. (AI generated)

Western Sydney offers a range of tourist attractions and activities across the region.

These tourist attractions and activities are quality experiences for visitors. The disadvantage is that they are spread across Western Sydney, a vast area. Their location is fragmented, not concentrated in a single small area, unlike the Sydney CBD and Sydney Harbour. They are decentralised. This is problematic and adds nothing to a cohesive community or sense of place.

One unifying feature of Western Sydney is its food culture, which attracts Sydneysiders from all over the metropolitan area. The variety of food cultures is a unifying force, rooted in immigrant communities. Sydney’s foodie elite understand the knowledge and skills of the immigrant communities across Western Sydney.

A question to AI: What are the food experiences of Western Sydney?

Rich foodie scene

Western Sydney offers a rich foodie scene driven by multiculturalism, featuring authentic global eats from “Little India” (Harris Park) to Cabramatta (Vietnamese) and Merrylands (Afghan/Persian), alongside trendy cafes, artisan markets (Parklea), brewerys, and even urban farms, providing experiences from vibrant street food to upscale dining and hands-on cooking classes. 

Key Food Hubs & Experiences:

• Harris Park (Little India): Sydney’s hub for subcontinental food, with dozens of eateries offering authentic Indian street food, sweets, and meals (e.g., Chatkazz, Ginger Indian).
• Cabramatta: Famous for Vietnamese pho (Pho Tau Bay), fresh produce, and street food stalls.
• Parramatta: A central spot with diverse options like authentic Malaysian (Temasek), Korean (Hangang By Mama Park), and Cantonese BBQ (Sun Ming BBQ).
• Merrylands/Lakemba: Explore Afghan, Persian, and Middle Eastern flavors at places like Al Shami or through cultural food tours.
• Campsie: Known for Malaysian food (Albee’s Kitchen) and Chinese snacks (Tianjin Bun Shop). 

Diverse Cuisines & Styles:

• Street Food Adventures: Sample everything from Malaysian Nasi Lemak (Mamu Penang) to Korean rice rolls (Tomato Kimbab).
• Artisanal & Local: Discover craft breweries (Ambarvale Brewing Co), fresh produce at markets, and unique experiences like truffle or herb growers.
• Modern & Upscale: Find trendy cafes, modern Australian restaurants, and precincts like West HQ’s Eat Street for global dining.
• Cultural Walks: Join guided tours to explore hidden culinary gems and stories behind immigrant cuisines. 

Activities:

• Hands-on Learning: Take cooking classes at places like In Cucina Cooking Academy.
• Picnics & Parks: Enjoy DIY BBQs or grab cafe meals in expansive green spaces like Western Sydney Parklands. 

In essence, Western Sydney’s food scene is a delicious journey through cultures, offering authentic, affordable, and innovative tastes for every palate. (AI generated)

Western Sydney has a thriving, exciting and eclectic food scene, rich in the smells and flavours from around the world. The area is emerging as a vibrant cultural hub based around food.

The foodie scene reveals a rich resource for local tourism, and exploring the area is a feast for the senses. The food culture has the potential to create a sense of place and community across the disparate nature of Western Sydney.

Western Sydney’s food diversity is its strength, and its food scene is extraordinary. The different neighbourhoods have the potential to create an area that reflects a colourful mosaic of traditions, languages, and flavours. This is a unique window into Australia’s cultural diversity.

Creation of a new museum. Is the savour of Western Sydney?

Will the new Parramatta Powerhouse Museum add to the construction of a sense of place in Western Sydney? 

The new Parramatta Powerhouse has been criticised as being aimed at the elites, not the folk of Western Sydney. (Morris, L. (2025)

Journalist Linda Morris asks, ” Who is the new museum for?” She writes

The Powerhouse has the potential to shift how western Sydney sees itself – and how the rest of Sydney sees the region. Novelty will drive crowds, and it will probably exceed its 2 million-visitor first-year target. Havilah and her team will, however, need to walk a fine line between embedding the institution in its community and catering to interstate and international visitors drawn by a new airport. That delicate task was made harder by the decision to retrofit the Powerhouse to the Parramatta riverside.

When Morris spoke to a Powerhouse insider

“Let’s be real here,” says one sceptical Powerhouse staffer. “The art crowd of London and New York are not coming to Parramatta. This museum was intended for the people of western Sydney … and at this rate, they won’t be able to afford the ticketed shows.”

Locally, there has also been rising disquiet that the Powerhouse food programs are pitched to elites.

Cultural commentator Professor Andy Marks says the museum has connected well with corporate partners but must give disadvantaged communities greater agency. “The idea of a science-led institution was never a concept that captured the imagination of western Sydney. What got people excited was that it was an institution that it could shape.

There is a danger that the new Parramatta Powerhouse is in Western Sydney but not of Western Sydney. The museum could be a stranger in its own land.

The Parramatta Powerhouse will necessarily have blockbuster exhibitions to justify the hefty price tag to build it. What will they charge the Western Sydney punters? Westies are more likely to go to the footie next door than attend a museum opening.

At face value, Parramatta Powerhouse Museum (PPM) adds little to community identity and not a lot to a sense of place. The only similar creative space is the Casula Powerhouse, which is tiny in comparison.

The PPM is breaking new ground. The only institutions of a similar size in the West are licensed clubs that offer Happy Hour to their punters. What is the PPM’s Happy Hour going to be?

The Sydney elite will bitterly complain about travelling to the backblocks of Parramatta for any exhibitions. As they do at present. Will the blockbuster exhibitions attract the Sydney elite west of the ‘Coathanger’?

Will the PPM be an employment hub? Will PPM drive economic growth? Will PPM attract the international art set as Mona did on its opening? The new PPM is being compared with New York’s The Shed, but that is in New York, not Western Sydney. (Morris, L. (2025)

The early signs are not promising. Only time will tell.

Conclusion

What does all this mean for the West?

Jodie Vo has shown that it has taken a local of Western Sydney to understand Western Sydney. She is the only one who has truly come to grips with Western Sydney. She has identified that there are many Western Sydneys and her three-tier classification has nailed the nature of Western Sydney.

Western Sydney is The Other. Sydney’s Latte Line acts as a metaphor for the division between Sydney’s ‘haves’ and ‘have-nots’. Other socio-economic indicators, such as the location of Red Rooster stores, support this division. There is significant inequality across Greater Sydney.

 Convenient administrative boundaries for bureaucrats, planners, politicians and others will continue to impose dividing lines across the metropolitan area between east and west.

The creation of identifiable brands for Western Sydney can create an artificial, false sense of regional identity.

Western Sydney University was a convenient administrative arrangement that brought together a disparate group of learning institutions across Western Sydney under a single, identifiable brand.

The creation of  Western Sydney International, WSI, may provide a sense of place and increased identity for the Cumberland Plain. The increased economic activity may even level out the playing field of wealth across the metropolitan area.

Other identifiable branding for the west, from Western Sydney Zoo and Western Sydney Wanderers Football Club to the Greater Western Sydney Giants AFL team, may provide some solidarity and help construct a sense of place and identity for the area.

The increased importance of Parramatta as an economic and administrative hub may shift the decision-making dial slightly to the west. The location of the Olympics at Homebush in 2000 did change the centre of sporting influence in the city ever so slightly to the west for a fleeting moment. 

The identity of Western Sydney is problematic and far from resolved.

As Jodie Vo argues, there are many Western Sydneys, and this can be a problem.

Sydney’s west has a host of smaller regional identities, a form of local tribalism. Bernard Salt maintains that Sydney is ‘a city of tribes and precincts’, a product of the city’s geography and the values of its residents. (Salt 2012)

Kirsten Craze identified seven tribes of Sydney, including ‘the Might West’, while Sacha Molitorisz has identified eight youth tribes, and sociologist Gabrielle Gwyther says Sydney’s west contains ‘mulitudes’ of groupings. (Craze 2012; Molitorisz 2010; Robertson 2014)

According to WSU, the NSW Department of Planning divides the area into three sub-regions, and they are

• North-West: City of Blacktown, City of Blue Mountains, City of Hawkesbury and City of Penrith
• South-West: Camden Council, City of Campbelltown, City of Liverpool and Wollondilly Shire
• West Central: Auburn Council, City of Bankstown, City of Fairfield, City of Holroyd and City of Parramatta (WSU 2022)

Reflection

While the state government and ABS are happy to use artificial administrative regions with their inherent diversity, they have made no serious attempt to develop a cohesive narrative that contributes to the development of any authentic regional identity.

Some in the business sector feel that the Red Rooster chicken line is flexible and are out to prove that their business model works in Sydney’s more affluent suburbs. This clearly demonstrates the knowledge and skills of the people of Western Sydney. Western Sydney’s food culture has the potential to construct a sense of place and strengthen community identity.

Decision-makers need to take into account the inequalities experienced by Western Sydney compared to the more affluent parts of Sydney. Demonising Western Sydney as the outsider or The Other does not help.

Any notion of Western Sydney needs to be grounded in an authentic sense of place that will foster growth and a strong community identity. Not an artificial marketing and branding exercise. Only time will tell, and the area’s food culture has the potential to be all of this.

Do yourself a favour and experience the flavours of Western Sydney and eat your way through the area.

Resources

Bagshaw, Eryk & Inga Ting 2016. HSC results 2016: Sydney divided by education ‘latte line’. [online] The Sydney Morning Herald. Available at: https://www.smh.com.au/education/hsc-results-2016-sydney-divided-by-education-latte-line-20161221-gtfhpf.html.

 Baker, J. and Wade, M. (2021). Suburban fury: Delta divide deepens over Sydney hotspot lockdowns. [online] The Sydney Morning Herald. Available at: https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/suburban-fury-delta-divide-deepens-over-sydney-hotspot-lockdowns-20210916-p58s6i.html [Accessed 30 Oct. 2025].

Baskerville,  Bruce  2014. Blog comment, ‘Branding the Macarthur region’, PHA NSW. Posted 4 March 2014. Online @ http://www.phansw.org.au/branding-the-macarthur-region/ accessed 30 March 2014.

Bradfield Development Authority, 2025. Growing Western Sydney Exploring the First Building, Bradfield and beyond. NSWG. https://www.nsw.gov.au/about-nsw/precinct-development/delivering-bradfield-city-centre/first-building/growing-western-sydney

Camden Council 1996, Camden Interim Tourist Committee, Minutes, 26 June 1996.

Capuano, Glenn. (2025). Western Sydney profile – a region of diversity and growth. [online] Id.com.au. Available at: https://www.id.com.au/insights/articles/western-sydney-profile-a-region-of-diversity-and-growth.

Chrysanthos, N. and Ding, A. (2017). Food fault lines: mapping class through food chains. [online] Honi Soit. Available at: https://honisoit.com/2017/09/food-fault-lines-mapping-class-division-through-food-chains/.

Craze, Kirsten  2012. ‘The seven tribes of Sydney’, The Daily Telegraph, 11 July 2012.

 Dawson, Natalie. (2022). About Greater Western Sydney. [online] http://www.westernsydney.edu.au. Available at: https://www.westernsydney.edu.au/rcegws/rcegws/About/about_greater_western_sydney.

Ellis, E 2010. Sydney People and Places: the Cumberland Plain in the early 19th Century. Presentation at the Bowden Centre, The Australian Botanic Gardens,  Mount Annan on 21 February.

Ellis, E. (2019). Power and Influence on the Cumberland Plain. [online] State Library of New South Wales. Available at: https://www.sl.nsw.gov.au/stories/power-and-influence-cumberland-plain [Accessed 29 Oct. 2025].

Infrastructure Australia (2016). Western Sydney Airport shows the value of preserving strategically important sites and corridors | Infrastructure Australia. Press Release 23 November. [online] Infrastructureaustralia.gov.au. Available at: https://www.infrastructureaustralia.gov.au/listing/media-release/western-sydney-airport-shows-value-preserving-strategically-important-sites-and-corridors.

Johnstone, H. (2025). Chargrilled chicken wars: Is the Red Rooster Line being redrawn? [online] Realcommercial.com.au. Available at: https://www.realcommercial.com.au/news/chargrilled-chicken-wars-is-the-red-rooster-line-being-redrawn [Accessed 5 Dec. 2025].

Knight Foundation. (2010). Soul of the Community – Knight Foundation. [online] Available at: https://knightfoundation.org/sotc/.

Militorisz, Sacha 2010.  ‘Tribes of Sydney’, The Sydney Morning Herald, 7 January 2010.

Montoya, Daniel. (2015). Western Sydney: an economic profile Briefing Paper No 10/2015. [online] http://www.parliament.nsw.gov.au. Available at: https://www.parliament.nsw.gov.au/researchpapers/Documents/western-sydney-an-economic-profile_1/Western%20Sydney%20-%20an%20economic%20profile.pdf.

Morris, L. (2025). Is our new ‘museum’ brilliant, bonkers or just a big box? [online] The Sydney Morning Herald. Available at: https://click.email.fairfaxmedia.com.au/?qs=6cb26078552efa32840071cbf30be99343779fd07c65af9de742ff7f60375b1290b882d04615d8b421c19673a8ba68bb2be3cc5db5ccd228bcab75a1125e74d1 [Accessed 4 Dec. 2025].

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(Disclaimer: Generative AI has been used in the construction of this post with summaries and captions)