see also
We stay in YHA Civic and used to stay in Carotel Watson and visit the National Library of Australia for research purposes. NLA has all the newspapers there. This was for research for S Preston Walker's books 'Enriching Australia through educating indigenous people' on Mt Margaret and NSW and 'The Bible to thousands' for the Bible Society in QLD and NSW. I stay at EPIC in Mitchell.
Local news is in Canberra Times. Public transport is by ACTION buses using MyWay electronic ticketing and Google Transit travel planner. AllHomes.com.au lists real estate. Canberra is expensive to rent or buy a house.
A new Canberra Airport Terminal is being built for $200M with a Brindabella Business Park only 4 years old right next to it. Australian Defence Force Academy (ADFA) is very close to the airport. The road to the airport has been upgraded to a 2 lane highway to cope with the increased traffic to the business park and airport. There is real growth in Canberra with in effect only 2 layers of government to manage the projects so less hindrances than other states who have 3 layers of government. The airport has no curfew so has longer operating hours than Sydney Airport making it very competitive for overflow traffic and southcoast flights.
Webblast was held in December 2009 at SMS Management and Technology at Brindabella Business Park which I attended and met many Web designers and developers in Canberra.
From 28/9/09 to 11/10/09 I busked as folk fiddler at several locations in the Tilt Busking Festival briefly as part of Floriade and mainly in Canberra Citywalk area.
In November 2009, we setup a Flash Website based on a template for a bookshop in Curtin ACT. This includes a calendar based on iCal uploaded from Mac OS X. In November 2011, we added more features and cleaned up the calendar and newsletter area of the site.
In April-May 2010, we had 1 violin student in Kippax via Belconnen. We installed new strings on the student's violin and taught them in their home.
I go to Canberra City Uniting Church. This city has a tendency for members to leave or shop around with churches due to personal convictions that they are more holy than the established church which plays into disunity and more secularism. More prayer and involvement would definitely stop this bad trend. I guess this is post-modernism.
In May 2010, I played violin for a family service at St Columba's, Braddon, a very friendly, warm, lovely congregation I would recommend visiting or joining - a real blessing!
In October 2010, Gungahlin Uniting Church was opened which will be a boost to the local community in a sparse new part of North Canberra. The Church helps where the Government does not do much to build things up. I missed the opening but I heard it was a joyful affair!
The Early Morning Centre (EMC) was refurbished, expanded and opened at Canberra City Uniting Church on 6.7.2011 with $750,000 from the ACT Government. Ms Joy Burch MLA, ACT Minister for Community Services did the honours. See story (PDF). Homeless people can have breakfast, a shower and have their clothes washed overnight in a laundry. What a blessing! Brendan who was struck down with cancer worked on this project. It is amazing what Canberra City Uniting Church does in a practical way for inner city Canberrans. There is a huge amount of generosity in this church. They live the Gospel.
In December 2009, we continued business leads in Canberra. Here we can tender for Australian Government contracts. In January-February, April-June and August 2010, we rebuilt capital, turning the corner on funding.
From September 2010, cost of staying in Canberra got too dear so I am only visiting briefly now. This ends 1 year of work in Canberra with busking and Web development.
In January 2011, I started designing a library for Fusion in Kambah. In November 2011, I finished the setup of the library using Collectorz.com.
In November 2011, we revisited Canberra and did more Web development and playing of violin! This was a 2 year gap.
In November 2011, Vodafone 3G 850MHz is blazingly fast in Canberra - 4-7MBit/sec for downloads! This is the best in Australia I've found and makes it very good for IT business. This was in Mitchell.
Since 2009, Canberra has a $5.2Bn building boom including apartments and refitting CBD buildings.
8000 more units worth $2Bn are going to be built in Canberra over next 3 years by 2013-14 (Belconnen, Braddon, Lyneham, Tuggeranong, Kingston, Woden, Campbell, Gungahlin, Civic, Molonglo) - 2000-2500/year (my observations and Canberra Times 11/11). This is a staggering growth phase for Canberra! Most will be rented to young people moving here for government jobs.
ACT Government is looking for submissions from business community re how to improve business prospects in ACT. Deadline: 14 Feb 2012. This is a very IT savvy, well educated city with a booming construction industry that is not well promoted.
Created 14 Sep 2009 11:20