As Covid-19 restrictions gripped Melbourne and Sydney, thousands of residents made a run for it. Melbourne alone lost almost 80,000 residents between mid-2020 and mid-2021, while Sydney dropped just more than 25,000 residents in the same period, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics. Those wanting to escape Melbourne and Sydney seemed to flock to Western Australia and Queensland. Perth raked in a whopping 26,000 more residents during the 12-month period, while Brisbane gained almost 19,000.Adelaide also grew in size, pulling in more than 7000 residents, while the ACT gained almost 3000.Some city residents decided it was time to pack up and drive inland or down the coast, with regional Victoria experiencing an increase of 20,000 residents and regional NSW embracing almost 25,000 extra residents.Melbourne suburbs Carlton, Brunswick and Prahran – all usually with a large number of university students – were abandoned during heavy lockdowns. Sydney seemed to experience a similar phenomenon, with student-heavy areas like Kensington and Potts Point shedding more than 2000 residents each. Newtown, Bondi Beach, Surry Hills and Glebe lost close to 1000 residents each.Regional centres or coastal areas were the key destinations for movers, with Melbourne residents restationing themselves just outside the state’s infamous “ring of steel” during the Covid-19 pandemic.Popular wine district Warragul-Drouin, which sits just outside Greater Melbourne, experienced a population boom, with an extra 1651 residents causing a 4 per cent swell in population. Inland Victoria also scored new residents, with Ballarat and Albury-Wodonga on the NSW-Victorian border and Greater Bendigo in Central Victoria bringing in thousands.In NSW, Sydney residents wanting to stay on the coast set up camp in Newcastle-Maitland and Ballina, while those who headed inland moved to Dubbo, Orange and Bathurst.Batemans Bay, St Georges Basin, Nowra and Ulladulla are all also growing at above-average levels.Melbourne’s mass exodus has caused the proportion of Australians living in capital cities to decline for the first time this century, slipping to 67.2 per cent last year after peaking at 67.4 per cent.Across Australia, a net decrease of almost 50,000 people was felt in capital cities through the 12-month period compared with an 80,000 lift in Australians in regional locations.The ABS data, which highlighted changes in populations across the country between 2011 and 2021, registered an 11 per cent jump in those living in regional Australia. Melbourne still ranks No.1 among the states for attracting new residents in the past decade, with an extra 806,800 residents living there. Darwin grew the least, with a mere 19,700 additional residents.Canberra snatched first prize for the highest growth rate at 23 per cent, while Adelaide had the lowest at 11 per cent.
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