Yes it does sound as though we have similar lives!!
The one thing I found I really had to do when planning our move here was to make sure I took my rose coloured glasses off! I think I had idealised Aust so much that it was begining to seem like Disneyland!
Melbourne is a big city like any other, there are the same scumbags here, crime, annoying big city traffic etc.
I am realy not sure of the job market at the moment. Have you had a look on www.seek.com.au/ to see if there are many vacancies in your field? When we came here DH was working in recruitment which he loathed - thankfully he was able to find the same job he did in London here and changed after 10 months.
As for the suburbs you have mentioned I really know nothing about them. We live in Point Cook which is a very new outer western suburb. It really ticked all of our boxes as it is all new housing, open spaces, playgrounds, reasonable shopping and Altona/Williamstown beaches are pretty close. Rent for a 4 bed house, garden, 2 bathrooms and Air con start at about $300/wk - which is pretty good.
My DH works in the city and catches the train in, it takes him about 40mins and there is plenty of parking at the tain station. It takes about 25mins to get into the city from here as it is all on the Westgate freeway.
I made sure I joined a local plagroup asap and have met most of my lovely friends there. With this being such a new suburb I haven't really come across too much cliquey bullshit.
I have also met some of my most lovely friends on here. There are quite few MNers here in Melb and we try to meet up for a meal every couple of months. We have also been known to meet up at playcentres, the museum and The Queen Vic markets for shopping.
I also appreciateed the privacy of London too and if it makes you feel any better, we have lived in our current house for over 2 years and I have never spoken to our neighbours (neither has DH).
I have been looking at schools DD is starting prep next year and I haven't come across any that a really bad at all. My DH is very anti private/religious schools so we haven't looked at them at all. I am more than happy with the state school system - so far! We lived in East London and the schools near where we lived were awful, run down and violent - there is nothing anywhere near like that here!!
The shopping here is a bit sad compared to London and the supermarkets might make you cry the first few times you go shopping. Costco has just opened here though and I will have to go and check it out. Online shopping is almost nonexistent too. But is is fab to be able to easily buy twisties, burger rings, cherry ripes, chokitos... again!