Ari and I have started walking around the Victor Harbor township on some of our early morning poodle walks. We needed a change from walking the beach at the western end of Encounter Bay each morning at dawn and I wanted to start walking earlier that 6.45am. We can wander around the town in the dark because of the street lights, and then I can take photos after dawn has broken.
There are only a few people about the town at this time of the morning–mostly groups of people walking across the causeway to Granite Island and back again.
The National Broadband Network people, who were very visible laying cable in the township and around Encounter Bay, seem to have disappeared. I don’t see any crews working on the streets whilst making my way back to Encounter Studio. And there I was thinking that the western end of Encounter Bay where we live would be getting FTTP in the next 6 months. That’s a dream.
The NBN Co appears to have slowed down its broadband rollout under the new Multi-Technology Mix (MTM) and I fear that our area of Encounter Bay will be outside the fibre footprint.
I’ve also noticed that there is very little development happening in the town. Desirable sites along the foreshore in the town are awaiting development, but the blocks remain empty. It’s been like this–stasis— since the Global Financial Crisis, which is now more than a half a decade ago.
Despite the low interest rate regime it is still a case of low economic growth, rising unemployment and static house prices. There is little evidence of there being investment in the education and training so as to help to equip people for “skills-biased” work into the emerging knowledge economy.