BUILDING IN SYDNEY

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 931, 26 March 1930, Page 6

BUILDING IN SYDNEY

FIGURES FOR 11 YEARS

GREAT PROGRESS MADE

In the past 11 years over 109,900 buildings have been erected in Sydney at a cost of over £129,000,000. During 1929 expenditure on new buildings was over £16,000,000, about equal to the figures of 1928. This is the only period for many years In which the figures have not increased by leaps, due principally to the fact that the timber strike delayed the completion of many structures. The number of new buildings in 1929 was 9,900. This total was exceeded in 1928 by nearly 2,000. This is accounted for by the larger and more expensive fiat, commercial and residential buildings erected in 1929. Sydney's progress, in good times and bad, can be measured by its building figures. In 1914, 10,546 buildings, at a cost of £6,775,548, were erected. Then the war intervened and figures dropped to 4,998 at £3,726,896 in 1918.

The extent to which construction costs have been increased is strikingly illustrated by the fact that in 1924 the average was £698 a btfllding, whereas last year it amounts to about £1,600. Average cost of homes m the suburbs in 1925 was £BS7, compared with £899 in 1926, £995 in 1927, £9BO in 1925, and over £I,OOO in 1929. This is due partly to the increased cost of labour and material, but mostly to the fact that a better type of building is being erected.

Figures for the past six years are: — 1924 .. Buildings. Expenditure. £14,346.071 11.5S7.149 13,128,722 14,226,990 16,000,000 16,000,000 1929 .. .. .. 9,924