Town Hall Steps

Hey, remember the days before mobile phones? I do.
Which should tell you a little bit about how disgustingly old I am. And, if you can’t remember the days before phones, let me impart some wisdom to you, young’un. Dump some Ritalin and calm your allergies so you can focus on what I’m about to tell you.
BM (Before Mobiles) was a heady time to be alive. If you wanted to talk to a girl you had to grab the house phone and sneak into the laundry, threading the cord under the door, and hope that your brother didn’t cotton on. «Mummmm! He’s on the other line!»
If you wanted to meet your friends to go gallivanting around the city, well, you did it at Town Hall Steps. This was the meeting place for everyone, ever. With no way to contact each other, you were sometimes waiting there for hours if Tommy missed the bus or Rob fell down that manhole again and had to work his way through the sewer complex to get out.
Gods, but I made some good friends on those steps. Got a date out of them too when some poor girl’s friends never showed and she had no choice but to talk to me.
Those were good days. Now go away while I suck on my teeth for a while and fumble around for my cholesterol meds.

Waiting waiting waiting…
This is a very common waiting spot in the Sydney CBD, be it waiting to meet up with friends or waiting for the nightride bus.
Or if you love people watching, this is where it’s all happening, and you may spot the odd protest/​rally or Gangnam style flash mob
There’s something in in for almost everyone of all ages.

Located directly opposite Town Hall station, and the QVB, the Town Hall Steps are a monument in themselves. They are iconic in the area for being a marching/​meeting spot for everything from Protests to blind dates. You’ll often see a huge range of people that flow like air through one of Sydney’s busiest intersections that cross William & George Street. Right now, the beautiful installation from Artist Janet Echelman, whose TedTalk is amazing
Enjoy the entertainment that comes from sipping on a coffee and watching passes by, it’s a great time for thinking, although very loud, if you like the city culture, and sounds you’ll enjoy the steps.

If you enjoy people watching Town Hall Steps is a great place to sit and watch people go by… and let me tell you there are many characters that will catch your interest — sometimes its protestors, sometimes its flirty high school girls with high school boys, sometimes its old school emos or perhaps a tourist looking slightly uncomfortable that they’ve landed into a cultural mish mash…
Either way you’re guaranteed to be at least entertained and with a new matinée show everyday, it makes for a great place to do an anthropological study.
ps: Don’t be too scared of the grungy teenagers — their bark is worse than there bite…

The Town Hall Steps are an all-​time classic. Not that this is necessarily a good thing, but they’re iconic at the very least. While a central and convenient place to organise your meet-​up, take the opportunity to observe this microcosm of society through a pair of dark sunglasses. People in suits brush shoulders with people who will choose to never own a suit, people in furry animal suits will cavort, foreigners will show up in a cavalcade of accents, and everyone will generally defeat the purpose of having a set of stairs, which is to use them to ascend into the building.
Enjoy the sights and the ease of organising your meet.

‘Meet you at Town Hall Steps at (insert time here).‘
The grand steps in front of Sydney Town Hall is the kind of place that if you only wait long enough, absolutely everyone you would want to meet will pass by. At any given moment, there’s a scattering of people calmly sitting and chatting, or waiting and watching the world. It’s a prime place for charity hawkers now too, so be prepared with an extra few coins, but it remains one of those central landmarks essential to guiding people around the city.
The other day as I sat and collected my thoughts, I got to watch the dazzling parade of people walk past, all under an enormous artpiece hung over the crossing as part of the Art & About street art festival. It was made of net and shifted and blew in the breeze. Next to the Town Hall were dotted some deckchairs, in which people sat and soaked in the spring sun. A great place to while away a few spare moments.