2019 Federal Election Special Part 3: Newtown

What? You thought we were done with these election posts?

There's a third major party in politics that we haven't mentioned yet, and that's The Greens. Bonus instalment!

If you haven't already, have a read of Part 1 and Part 2 of this miniseries first, where I visit the Laborest and Liberalest suburbs, respectively.

Which suburb had the strongest support for The Greens?

Just like the first two in the series, this is all based on the AEC's data from the 2016 election. The AEC releases data down to the individual polling place so in this post I am covering the suburb with the polling place which contained the highest portion of first-preference Greens voters.

As always, the "weird" polling places (such as hospitals and pre-polls), and electorates outside of Sydney are excluded. 

If you're a Sydney local, you'll be entirely unsurprised to hear that the suburb with the strongest Greens vote in the 2016 election was...

Newtown

One of the polling booths in Newtown is named "Camperdown South" by the AEC. Confusingly, the polling place is located in Newtown rather than in nearby Camperdown, causing me to almost visit the wrong suburb for this post before I realised. 

Regardless, a very respectable 41.6% of Camperdown South polling booth voters for the Inner West electoral division of Grayndler had The Greens as their first preference. This was stronger than any other party, including the two majors, despite Grayndler being considered a safe Labor seat. 

For what it's worth, Meow-Ludo Disco Gamma Meow-Meow of the Science Party managed to score 21 votes here so that's something. 

Anyway, onto the suburb. 

Newtown has a train station but this being Sydney on a weekend, a train-replacement bus dropped me off on Newtown's hectic King Street, roughly in the middle of the suburb.

The station sits just in front of a major three-way intersection where King Street meets Enmore Road. 

King Street is Newtown's main artery and is almost always packed. Today was no exception. 

I had a travel companion with me today, and we started the journey by heading south along King Street.

Once we started, Newtown immediately began doing its thing. You've got tattoo and smoke shops,

a High School exclusively for "drama kids"

alternative clothing stores draped in pride flags,

and even vegan pho. My sincere apologies are extended to any readers who came here after my Cabramatta post. 

The plan was to have lunch at the most Newtown place in existence, so we went here. This is Lentil As Anything. 

Lentil As Anything is a vegan, pay-what-you-want, not-for-profit restaurant. It's also exceedingly popular.

Interestingly, they do not have a set menu, so you will see a different menu every time you come.

Today, we enjoyed a Thai-style satay curry and a potato soup (which tasted more like sweet potato but who am I to question a chalkboard menu). I am very much an omnivore, but this food was good.

We were also offered some soy chai. While I'm happy to eat vegetarian and vegan food, I'm yet to find an occasion where bean juice suffices in place of milk.

Of course, this being Newtown, the restaurant also has an upstairs portion which serves as an open space for plenty of Inner West activities such as yoga, yoga, improv, yoga and something called a soul calling workshop.

Look, I'm making fun of the place because it's so bloody easy to, but in truth I very much enjoyed this absolutely buzzing with life lentilly wonderland. 

After making our contribution for lunch (plus a little extra), we continued on our Newtownian journey, turning onto an alleyway off King St.

One of the pleasures of walking through Newtown are all the murals and street art you see whichever way you turn your head.

This was the case all the way as we made our way across the also hectic Enmore Road,

past this interesting little warehousey bit,

and to the nearby Young Henry's Brewery.

While we weren't in a position to stop for a beer today, this particular piece of art spoke to me and my lifestyle choices.

While I'm sure it's not for everyone, the endless graffitied alleys of Newtown make even the quiet corners of the suburb pop with that perfect ratio of colour and just the right amount of grime. 

Back to the main road.

The goal was now to backtrack and head to the bit of King Street just north of the station. Unfortunately, we didn't get far before being tempted by this Turkish cafe.

I'm normally good to keep walking past sweets but their Turkish delight visible from the window outside spoke to us, causing us to enter the store.

Once inside, this ice cream spoke to me even more.

I can confirm that the Cacao Turkish Coffee flavour was enough to make a grown man weep. (When did we start calling cocoa cacao anyway? Damn marketers.) Anyway, Turkish ice cream is thicker and gooier than gelato or the like, but I can also confirm that it is equally delicious. 

We didn't try their baklava but that looked pretty alright too. 

With the unexpected calories added to our journey, we continued on and returned to the three-way-crossing,

but not before meeting our state premier.

Rather than continue along King St for now, we ducked in behind the station,

and down this extremely narrow brick "road",

to take a peek at the old tram depot behind the station. Neat. 

Crossing this bridge over the rail line took us back to King St.

This bit of King Street sits at Newtown's most iconic mural. Quoting Martin Luther King Jr over the Aboriginal flag, I believe the meaning tells itself. 

Once again, we took a turn off of King Street,

to check out Camperdown Memorial Park. 

Before entering the park, I couldn't help admire just how Inner West the scene immediately across the road from the park is.

Also, for what it's worth, just around the corner from the park is Australia Street Infants School. This is entirely unnotable apart from the fact that this was the location of the famed "Camperdown South" polling booth which returned Sydney's strongest Greens vote. Riveting.


Anyway, Camperdown memorial park is great, with plenty of open space to sit or go for a stroll.

This part of the park is an off-leash area at certain hours, which means plenty of opportunities for spotting scamps and shags of all varieties.

This long and decorated fence cuts through the park.

On the other end of that fence is a heritage church and graveyard from the late 18th century, in case you need a little bit of history to go with your pups.

Interestingly, this graveyard once had a much larger footprint than it does today. At least some of the gravestones which would have had to be moved from the former sections of the cemetery appear to have been migrated to the surrounding fence. This leaves an interesting, albeit macabre aesthetic. 

On the way back to King Street, I was stopped by this amazing little row of terraced houses, which have both a beautifully ornate facade, as well as funky mural painted on the side. 

This might make me some enemies, but King Street itself, while being Newtown's most famous street, I've never really thought was that special.

Yes, it's full of all kinds of prime Newtown options, such as this ad for live drag shows at the Newtown Hotel,

as well as its fair share of beautiful heritage storefronts,

but to me, Newtown's always been more of an attitude, a culture, and King Street is just the main connection into it. 

Anyway, there were a few vintage houses I wanted to check out before I headed off, so I turned off of King St one final time onto this tree-lined sidestreet,

and past this poster of Lord Voldemort. 

Here, I found an entire street of beautifully maintained terraces with the rainbow colours, the ornate railings, and the whole nine yards. 

Interestingly, just across the road is this synagogue, only identifiable by the Hebrew writing up top. This is the first Jewish place of worship I've come across on my adventure so I'm not sure how typical the style of building is, but here we are regardless. 

Apparently, it was built in 1918, meaning it had its 100th birthday last year. 

Finally, around the corner is this final collection of well maintained historic houses that I wanted to peek at before I headed off. Very nice.

After an excellent couple hours exploring this crazy little suburb, a short walk back to King Street put me on the bus back home. 

Newtown: Honestly, who else could it have been?

That's it for the 2019 election series (for real this time). If you enjoyed this, please feel free to share this post with your friends, and subscribe by email, Facebook or Instagram to keep up to date with my adventures.

And as one final election-related public service announcement: as long as you number your ballot paper correctly, your vote still counts if you draw, say, a fried egg next to Fraser Anning's party.

Thanks for reading - we will return to our regular programming on Sunday.