Quote ="Lovesauce"So how has Newcastle changed since much of it's industry disappeared? Many of those lake areas to the south were there 30 years ago - theyre nothing now.'"
Newcastle has ridden on the resources boom for the last 15 or 20 years. Coal exports from the port of Newcastle have risen from around 50 million tonnes a year to around 150 million tonnes a year, while the price went from something like $60 a tonne up to over $200 a tonne.
Towns like Muswellbrook have gone from poor little farming villages to being in the top 10 postcodes in the country for average earnings, as coal miners pull in wages over a quarter of a million. A few Knights players have actually quit football to become coal miners because they can earn more.
Lake Macquarie (the area to the South of Newcastle - and the birthplace of Knights players like Willie Mason, Josh Perry, Clint Newton, Paul Harrogan, Brett Kimmorley, Adam Muir and dozens of others) is one of the fastest growing areas in Australia, with the population rising from around 80k to over 200k in the past 40 years or so, and there are now several suburbs in both Lake Macquarie and Newcastle where average house prices are over the million dollar mark.
In short, the city and the district is booming.
Whether it keeps on booming now that the resources boom is running out of steam is another question, but right now the streets are paved in black gold.
