More and more heavy machinery is snacking on our suburbs at the behest of private developers, our own state government, or a combination of both. The casualties are nesting birds, endangered possums, innumerable tiny critters and plants, and their human friends. The greater casualty is our ecosystem, let’s call it our way of life.

Communities across Sydney have contacted TEC almost every day this year upset by the spectacle of their favourite trees, green retreats, and patches of bush being chipped, mulched and crushed by bulldozers and chainsaws. The reasons are variously sited as practical, progressive and inevitable – whether it’s to build a new highway or lay out a light rail.

World best practice however shows that it absolutely is possible to modernise our growing cities, making them more efficient and accessible without compromising their human scale and natural assets.

Unfortunately when government puts development at any cost above the needs of our urban villages and communities, it is putting the lifestyle Australians hold dear at serious risk.

Without its beautiful natural setting Sydney would be just hard work - a mass of concrete, traffic and crowds. That's not why we live here. We live here because we love the climate and the harbour, the street life, the beaches and estuaries, the tree-lined boulevards and verdant parks. Kill these off and there's nothing left to love.

If you want to protect the things that make Sydney liveable and loveable, please join our SOS Green Spaces campaign  – we are knitting disparate communities together with information forums, maps, activist toolkits and strategies to protect our public parks and shared spaces. Hear community voices like yours here. Our supporters are growing. Together, we will be heard. Click here to support SOS Green Spaces