This is Canterbury in the inner western suburbs of Sydney. Over to my left, between the hoarding and the trees and park, runs Cook's River.

At one time this entire area was light industrial and similar. Sign manufacturers, joiners and turners, that sort of thing, What you are looking at here was the site of an old Mitre 10 hardware warehouse, which I frequented more than once over the years.

You can imagine my surprise when I turned into this street recently and found the Mitre 10 warehouse obliterated, along with many of the other light industrial places. To my 7 o'clock position there is a building which looks like a light fabrication plant from the 1960's, complete with receiving dock roller doors on the front. It's now abandoned and will doubtless also be obliterated in the near future.

Why the change? At a guess part of it has to do with the river. In the first 7/10ths or so of the 20th century it was less a river and more an industrial sewer for industrial plants upstream. And it stank. Bad. Since maybe the mid 80's a concerted effort has been made to clean it up so that it only periodically stinks. So now instead of being a source of rancid odour, it's become a water view. Combine that with seemingly endless demand for housing in Sydney and voila, it has gone from a place where only factories can live to "Vicinity ... a wonderful opportunity to invest in one of Sydney’s heralded property hot spots". (You probably won't be able to read the sign when I shrink this to 1000 pixels, but that's essentially what it says.)

With the transformation of course comes a decrease in affordability, with this once proudly blue collar area seeing its former residents move further and further away from the city proper.

This is of course a pano of three images.

Oh, what was I doing here? Digital Camera Warehouse is just back behind me on Canterbury Road. How many guesses do you need?