Getting around the Eastern Suburbs
Lots of suburbs, lots of postcodes
Woollahra, Waverley and Randwick make up the core, with parts of Bayside and the City of Sydney on the edges, and 267,037 people lived here at the 2016 census. Postcodes run from 2010 to 2036, so the postcode is the quickest way to reach a mechanic near the car.
Main roads in and out
New South Head Road, Oxford Street and Syd Einfeld Drive carry traffic to the city. Anzac Parade, Bunnerong Road and the Eastern Distributor head for the south-east and the airport, with Old South Head Road and Bondi Road between them.
Clifftops and beaches
Bronte, Clovelly, Coogee and Maroubra are all on this stretch of coast, and salt air comes with them. Salt speeds up rust on bare steel, so an underbody check earns its place at each service.
Cars that sit
With the Eastern Suburbs line to Bondi Junction, light rail to Randwick and Kingsford, and ferries at the harbour bays, some cars only come out at weekends. RACV lists long periods parked among the usual reasons a battery goes flat.
Blue slips: cars from interstate, or off the road
A blue slip, now officially an authorised unregistered vehicle inspection, is needed when the rego has been expired for more than 3 months, when the car has come from another state, territory or country, when it has no number plate, or when it's a write-off approved for re-registration. It's valid for 42 days from the inspection.
That takes in the car driven up from Melbourne and the one that sat in a garage while its owner was overseas. Not every inspection station does every check: NSW requires AIS stations to display signs out the front listing what they can do. Pink and blue slips in Sydney has the full rules.
For everything else, a mobile mechanic can handle a lot here, from batteries to servicing, if there's a flat, safe spot off the road. Mobile mechanics in Sydney covers what to sort out first.
Where we'd start
For a car arriving from interstate, we'd have a mechanic look it over and fix anything obvious before the blue slip inspection. It means fewer surprises at the station, and the car is ready to register sooner.