Alice Springs 1

Several small immigrant communities of other foreign cultures have found a home in Alice Springs, including Vietnamese, Chinese, Thai, and Indian ethnic groups. The most obvious impact of their presence in such a small and isolated town has been the opening of various restaurants serving their traditional cuisines. 

Alice Springs has a large itinerant population. This population is generally composed of foreign and Australian tourists, Aboriginal Australians visiting from nearby Central Australian communities, and Australian or international workers on short-term contracts (colloquially referred to as "blow-ins"). The major sources of work that recruit workers into town are the stations and mines. Foreign tourists usually pass through on their way to Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park, whilst Australian tourists usually come through as a part of an event such as the Masters Games and the Finke Desert Race. These events can cause the population of the town to fluctuate by several thousand within a matter of days.  

The Alice Springs Town Council governs the Alice Springs area, which takes in the town centre, its suburbs and some rural area. The Alice Springs Town Council has governed Alice Springs since 1971. The Alice Springs council consists of 9 members, the Mayor and 8 aldermen. The town is not divided up into wards. The current mayor of Alice Springs is Damien Ryan. Council Meetings are held on the last Monday of each month. The Alice Springs Region is governed by the newly created shire MacDonnell Shire, for which Alice Springs serves as council seat.

Alice Springs and the surrounding region have five elected members to the Northern Territory Legislative Assembly. There is one elected member of the Federal Parliament in the Australian House of Representatives for the area outside of Darwin, the Electoral Division of Lingiari.  

Alice Springs began as a service town to the pastoral industry that first came to the region. The introduction of the rail line increased its economy and productivity. Today the town services a region of 546,046 square kilometres (210,830 sq mi) and a regional population of 38,749. The region includes a number of mining and pastoral communities, the Joint Defence Space Research Facility at Pine Gap and tourist attractions at Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park, Watarrka National Park and the MacDonnell Ranges.

The largest employer in Alice Springs is the Northern Territory Government, with 7.5% of employed people working in government administration, 6.6% in school education, and 3.7% in the Alice Springs Hospital.  The economy of Alice is somewhat reliant on domestic and international tourism, with 3.8% of its workforce employed providing accommodation. It is home to the Northern Territory's largest dedicated travel organiser, Territory Discoveries, which employs over 50 full time local staff members. 

As well as Territory Discoveries, all major tour companies have a base in Alice Springs, including AAT Kings & APT, as well as numerous local operators, including Emu Run Tours, Anganu Waai! tours, Alice Wanderer and Wayoutback Desert Safaris, the only locally based Advanced Ecotourism Accredited operator.

Alice is home to numerous hotels, from the 5-star Lasseters Hotel Casino, to the backpacker standard Toddies Resort. Also, there are several caravan parks for the driving visitor.

A dispatch centre for the Royal Flying Doctor Service of Australia operates here. 

Further information: List of schools in the Northern Territory

Education is overseen territory-wide by the Department of Education and Training (DET). It works to continually improve education outcomes for all students, with a focus on Indigenous students.  

Alice Springs is served by nineteen public and private schools that cater to local and overseas students. Over 3,843 primary and secondary students are enrolled in schools in Alice Springs, with 2,187 students attending primary education, and 1,656 students attending secondary education. There are over 1,932 students enrolled in government schools and 1,055 students enrolled in independent schools. 

Alice Springs has an Alice Springs School of the Air which delivers education to students in remote areas. 

The Alice Springs Campus of Charles Darwin University offers courses in TAFE and higher education. The Centre for Appropriate Technology was established in 1980 and provides a range of services to encourage and help Aboriginal people enhance their quality of life in remote communities. 

Alice Springs has occasionally been referred to as the lesbian capital of Australia owing to an unsubstantiated perception that there is a large percentage of lesbians in the population.   

The town's focal point, the Todd Mall, hosts a number of Aboriginal art galleries and community events. Alice Springs’ desert lifestyle has inspired several unique events, such as the Alice Desert Festival Camel Cup, the Henley-on-Todd Regatta, Beanie Festival and the Finke Desert Race. The Finke Desert Race is some 400 kilometres (250 mi) south of Alice Springs in the Simpson Desert.

The American population celebrates most of the major American festivals, including Halloween, Independence Day and Thanksgiving. A portion of the Australian citizens engage in the festivities as well. 

Alice Springs is renowned as the Aboriginal Art capital of Central Australia, home to many local and Aboriginal art galleries.[30] Indigenous Australian art is the more dominant, and galleries showcase the rich culture and native traditions that abound in Central Australia. Trade in Aboriginal art soared after the painting movement began at Papunya, a Central Australian Aboriginal settlement, and swept other indigenous communities. Central Australia is the home of some of the most prominent names in Aboriginal art, including Emily Kngwarreye, Minnie Pwerle, Clifford Possum Tjapaltjarri, Albert Namatjira and Wenten Rubuntja.

The Araluen Centre for Arts and Entertainment presents world-class ballets and orchestras, as well as local performances.

Locals also enjoy meeting up in Konjo Park for BBQ's every Sunday at 11am. This is an excellent time to meet and greet the locals who can quite often undertake games of Football and Frisbee.

The annual Desert Mob Art Show sees art collectors and art lovers from all over the world travel to Alice Springs to see works from Aboriginal art centres in Central Australia, with works by artists from remote areas of the Northern Territory, South Australia and Western Australia. This show is in conjunction with the Artist Association Desart and usually runs in September of each year at the Araluen Art Centre. 

Crime is a significant social issue in Alice Springs. 

 In popular culture

• Liz Phair included a song called "Alice Springs" on her 1994 album Whip Smart.

• The group Midnight Oil mention Alice Springs in their songs "Kosciusko" and "Warakurna" ('There is enough in Redfern as there is in Alice'); and they mention Pine Gap in "Power and the Passion".

• The well-known Australian song My Island Home was originally written about the experience of an islander living 'west of Alice Springs', and this is mentioned in the lyrics of the original Warumpi Band version of the song.

• Nevil Shute's novel A Town Like Alice, and the resulting film and television mini-series, take their name from Alice Springs, although little of the action takes place there; because part of the story is set in Willstown (possibly modelled on Burketown) situated north of Alice Springs, near the Gulf of Carpentaria. The heroine, Jean, wants to change Willstown into a town "like" Alice. The local library in Alice Springs is named after Nevil Shute: the Nevil Shute Memorial Library.

• A casino in Alice Springs is the destination for the drag queen protagonists in the Australian road movie The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert. 

Leisure and entertainment activities include hiking in the nearby MacDonnell Ranges, driving the four-wheel drive tracks at Finke Gorge National Park and visiting the many art galleries in Todd Mall. 

The Alice Springs Desert Park was created to educate visitors about the many facets of the surrounding desert environment. The arid climate botanic garden, Olive Pink Botanic Garden, is a short distance from the town centre. They were named after anthropologist, naturalist and artist Olive Pink, who lived in the town for almost 30 years and died in 1975. She was well known locally and referred to by all as Miss Pink. The Alice Springs Reptile Centre is located in the town centre.   

Alice Springs has a high rate of participation in many different sports, including tennis, hockey, Australian rules football, basketball, soccer, cricket and rugby football and boxing.

Rugby League has been a part of the local sporting scene since 1963. The Australian Rugby League has held a number of pre-season games in Alice Springs, at ANZAC Oval. The local competition is the Central Australian Rugby Football League, and sanctions both Junior and Senior Rugby League matches. The season usually kicks off around March/April and runs through to Late August. There are 4 senior teams in Alice Springs; Wests, Memo, United and Vikings. Matches are held during the winter months at ANZAC oval on Saturday afternoons.

Australian rules football is a particularly popular sport in Alice Springs in terms of both participation and as a spectator sport. The Central Australian Football League has several teams. The sport is particularly popular in Indigenous communities. The local stadium, Traeger Park, has a 10,000 seat capacity and was designed to host (pre-season) AFL and is currently home to the Northern Territory Thunder. In 2004, an AFL pre-season Regional Challenge match between Collingwood Football Club and Port Adelaide Football Club attracted a capacity sell-out crowd.

Organized baseball has been played in Alice Springs since the mid-1950s. Currently under the national organization of the Australian Baseball Federation, the Alice Springs Baseball Association organizes baseball competitions for youth players ages 5 - 18 and an adult competition played at Jim McConville Park and on Lyel Kempster Field at Traeger Park. As part of the world-wide Little League network, Alice Springs players and compete in the Australian National Little League competitions.

Cricket is a popular sport in Alice Springs and is primarily played at Traeger Park. The Imparja Cup Cricket Carnival first was played in 1994 and attracts Indigenous teams from all across Australia. The four main clubs are Federal Demons CC, Rovers CC, RSL Works CC and Wests CC.

Soccer is very popular among the younger community. A high number of children play it. Soccer is also played frequently by amateur adults in different divisions. There is also an all-African league for soccer in Alice Springs.

The Traeger Park sporting complex also hosts tennis, baseball, boxing, swimming, canoe polo, hockey, basketball, squash, badminton, gymnastics and skateboarding.

A unique sporting event, held annually, is the Henley-on-Todd Regatta, also known as the Todd River Race. It is a sand river race with bottomless boats and it remains the only dry river regatta in the world. Another unusual sporting event is the Camel Cup. This is also held annually at the local racetrack, Blatherskite Park. It is a full day event featuring a series of races using camels instead of horses.

The annual Camel Cup is held in July at Blatherskite Park, part of the Central Australian Show Society grounds.

Every year, on the Queen's Birthday long weekend, the annual Finke Desert Race is held. It is a grueling off-road race that runs from Alice Springs to the Finke community, then back again the next day. The total length of the race is roughly 500 kilometres (310 mi). It attracts spectators, who camp along the whole length of the track, and roughly 500 competitors, buggies and bikes, every year, making it the biggest sporting event in the Alice Springs calendar.  

Alice Springs is served by both local and national radio and television services. The government-owned ABC provides four broadcast radio stations – local radio783 ABC Alice Springs and the national networks ABC Radio National, ABC Classic FM and Triple J.

Commercial radio stations are 8HA 900 kHz and Sun 96.9 MHz and community radio is provided by indigenous broadcaster 8KIN 100.5 MHz.

Alice Springs is home to Australia's largest Indigenous media company. The Central Australian Aboriginal Media Association (CAAMA) consists of a radio station (CAAMA Radio), Music recording label (CAAMA Music), television and film production company (CAAMA Productions) and CAAMA technical. CAAMA serves to record and promote indigenous talent across its own radio network (one of the largest transmission footprints in the world), and through sales of CD's and screening of CAAMA movies and documentaries on national broadcasters.

Four broadcast television services operate in Alice Springs – commercial stations Imparja Television (callsign IMP9) and Southern Cross Central (QQQ31), and the Government-owned ABC (ABAD7) and SBS (SBS28). Imparja has a commercial agreement with the Nine network. Southern Cross Central has programming affillliations with both the Seven Network and Network Ten Australia.

Digital Television transmissions have commenced in Alice Springs. New channels provided by the ABC and SBS can be received with a digital set top box or digital television. Additional channels from the commercial broadcasters that are available in most other areas of Australia are expected to commence transmission in 2011–2012. Analogue television transmissions will be switched off by 31 December 2013.

Imparja Television is operated from studios in Alice Springs, It has a program affiliation contract with the Nine Network. The programming schedule on Imparja is the same as Nine Darwin NTD-8 and Channel 9 Brisbane with variations in Imparja's schedule for local Australian rules football, Rugby League, the children's show Yamba's Playtime, news, regional weather and other programs produced in Alice Springs by the station. Infomercials are shown in place of Home Shopping & other programs overnight and in some daytime timeslots. NITV is broadcast on the second channel allocated to Imparja by the Federal Government.

There are two local newspapers circulated in Alice Springs. The weekly publication, The Alice Springs News appears each Thursday; and the twice weekly The Centralian Advocate is published on Tuesdays and Fridays.  

Located on the Adelaide-Darwin railway, Alice Springs is accessible by train. Alice Springs railway station is visited by The Ghan, operated by Great Southern Railway, on its journey between Adelaide and Darwin. The train arrives twice weekly in each direction.

The line first opened to Alice Springs in 1929, as the narrow gauge Central Australia Railway. It was not until 1980 that the current standard gauge line was opened, which was extended to Darwin in 2004.

The Ghan
Tennant Creek (to Darwin)	↔	Alice Springs	↔	Kulgera (to Adelaide)

There are daily express coach services to and from Adelaide and Darwin servicing Alice Springs. The Stuart Highway, running north from Adelaide to Darwin via Alice Springs, is Northern Territory's most important road. The distance from Alice Springs to Adelaide is 1,530 kilometres (950 mi) and to Darwin is 1,498 kilometres (931 mi).

There are daily flights from Alice Springs Airport to Adelaide, Ayers Rock (Uluru), Cairns, Darwin, Melbourne, Perth and Sydney. There are also direct flights a few times a week to Brisbane. Two airlines serve Alice Springs: Qantas and Tiger Airways Australia. Virgin Blue made an appearance in Alice Springs for a short time, before it was undercut by Qantas.

Alice Springs is a base for the Royal Flying Doctor Service of Australia.

Sister cities:

•  Paghman, Afghanistan, since January 2005