I think Arden St North from Dolphin St, just North of Coogee beach, is longer and even more fearsome. The gradient doesn't really kick in til you pass Bream St.fatherofmany wrote:My father lives in Greenwood Ave Coogee, it's an insane hill.
And closer to home Georgiana Terrace in Gosford (the bit that runs off Henry Parry) is just plain dumb, my car doesn't even like it in first.
If you want to check this out, don't bother looking in Google Earth for elevations, or looking them up on http://mapmyride.com - the SRTM3 data for elevations doesn't work very well around coastal areas or places where there are steep changes.
But here's a way you might be able to estimate road steepness. Turn the Google maps streetview (as per link above) using the 90 turn arrows until you looking at right angles to the road. If that's parallel to the gradient, look for the angle that vertical posts, such as power poles, make to the ground - choosing one that extends to car-roof level (where the google map camera was mounted). In the case of Arden st, there's a cutting with a fence that makes angle measurement a snap. I found it reaches about 12 degrees, or approx 21% (near what google streetview labels as 174 Arden St).
If you want some hill challenges, there's more north between here and Bronte Rd. Bronte Rd from the beach west to where Leichardt St joins it is also seriously difficult - averaging about 8% over 1 km, and streetview photo measurement shows a few places around 17% or so.
Another tough one is the hill just west of Waverley cemetery St Thomas St, Woollahra.
Anyone living around here would find plenty of use for granny gears. If you're not too sure if your heart is up to it, Prince of Wales Hospital is nearby and has an excellent cardiac unit.
Lining up posts on Greenwood Ave Streetview indicates a gradient around the 20% mark too, so yes, it is steep - but shorter than the Arden St or Bronte Rd climbs.
It's a bit like Cronin Ave, Penshurst also around 20% for about 120 to 150 m - my poor mum pushed myself and 2 siblings up and down this hill to get shopping from Hurstville when we were newborns, and from 2 years on I walked it regularly. The hills on the Hurstville side of King Georges Rd are also a fair climb.
34 Wattle St, Bowen Mountain is, however, far more fearsome than any of the above. Lining up the posts indicates it's around 20%, and I think that's steeper than any part of Bowen Mountain Road. What makes it more fearsome is that to get there you have to climb constantly from Richmond (about 14 km away) - and you're at an elevation close to 420 m.
However, it's 22km from the nearest cardiac unit (Nepean Hospital) and 14 km from the ambulance station . While it might be a great place to train Cadel Evans' successors, it could not be fairly considered part of metropolitan sydney