Well we had beach volleyball at the 2000 Olympic Games and the ice skating rink in winter for last few years. Now Waverley Council has said it will host the International Beach Polo Tournament at Bondi Beach on 9th May 2015. This one day event is expected to attract around 4000 people and will involve bringing in polo ponies to Bondi Beach and the building of infrastructure to support such an event.

The Council has approved the event “in principle” subject to a few conditions, including the satisfactory submission of a final Event Management Plan (which meets traffic, parking and complying regulatory requirements) at least 16 weeks prior to the event occupation period.

It’s worth noting that this event was not unanimously approved. Four councillors opposed the motion to approve this proposal at the Council’s Operations Committee Meeting held on 1 July 2014.

There has been little press about this proposal, but here is an article written by Emily Contador-Kelsall.

Of course such an idea is completely ludicrous to me – and I suspect to many other locals also. Aren’t there already healthy numbers of tourists in Bondi Beach? Aren’t people all around the world already aware of Brand Bondi?

Yet, for Waverley Council, having Bondi host the International Beach Polo Tournament, [such] a prestigious international sporting event, “will help promote and showcase Bondi Beach to the rest of the world and could bring social, physical and economic benefits to Bondi.”

Really?

I think Sally Betts might need to knock on a few residents’ doors and really gauge how many locals think that attracting another 4000 people to Bondi in one day (together with all the other repercussions that such an event would have on the area) is going to bring them social, physical and economic benefits!

So here we are, in Autumn, all of us wondering where on earth the last few months have gone! Life just seems to get faster and faster as you age.

As for Bondi, it is still as busy as ever, still impossible to find a parking spot on the weekends and still hosting many changes to its landscape.

There is now a proposal being highly publicised by Waverley Council, to significantly change the beachfront area of Bondi.

I won’t go into all these changes here since they are already well-documented online (and in the traditional media), but I just want to say that the proposal is not insignificant; clearly lots of money and energy have already gone into this research and development phase of the proposal.

Flyer from Have Your Say day, 5th May 2013

Apart from the North Bondi Surf Club clubhouse – which is still being built – if all the proposed changes to the Bondi Pavilion and Bondi Park are approved and green lit, they would probably represent the biggest visual changes made to the now famous beachfront area in many years.

Just the other day, Waverley Council held a Have Your Say day at the Pavilion. I went along to ask questions and learn a bit more about what exactly is being proposed. On the face of it, it all sounds OK. But I do think the Council are treading a bit conservatively putting an effort in to manage the spin. They’re being very careful in their choice of language, (and somewhat vague when it comes to logistics and details), regarding the proposed changes, and there are still a number of issues not really being considered. Like…What if you do remove the parking from the beachfront? then you have an underground car park with approximately the same no of spaces, BUT can you imagine the road rage when it would take you one hour to get out the car park on a busy hot summer’s day?? At least when you’re in a traffic jam on the beachfront on such days you get to look at the pretty sights that Bondi has to offer!