By Councillor Charles Jago, updated 22 August 2024
The NSW government has released its plan for increasing housing density in North Strathfield, to directly affect all residents. See the rezoning proposal home page, the master plan, the precinct transport statement and the Explanation of Intended Effect documents. The Department of Planning, Infrastructure and Housing (DPHI) plans to rezone a large area of Strathfield, Homebush, North Strathfield and Concord West, on the Homebush side of the train line, as shown on the map below. It only affects zoning on the western side of the train line, i.e. the Homebush side. It runs from Parramatta Road at the Bakehouse Quarter up to Rothwell Avenue, as well as significant areas in Strathfield LGA along Underwood Road and more on the other side of Parramatta Road.
Also see the council response to the DPHI plan, which reveals the full extent of problems in it.
Large scale
The government’s plans will add around 16,000 apartments bringing approximately another 26,000 people into the North Strathfield and Strathfield triangle areas, plus many more in Strathfield LGA. The numbers on the map show the maximum building height for each block proposed by the government. The government hopes to start these programs in November this year, so major changes will be coming quickly.
No space allocated for schools or health facilities
The government’s plan doesn’t include space for any schools, health facilities or other infrastructure needed for current and future residents. The council wrote a submission to government which says that the 26,000 new residents proposed in the government’s plan equate to adding the population from a town the size of Taree, which has two public high schools, five public primary schools, six private schools, three post-secondary institutions and a large hospital.
Unfortunately, the government’s plan allows for no infrastructure at all. Only apartments. It’s not even sure there is enough retail or other commercial space either. In addition, the changes now on public exhibition include knocking down OLA primary school to make a park and also zoning McDonald College out of existence (it could stay there now but any new site development could only be apartments).
Unprofessional planning
That’s really bad planning. Given the scale of development proposed, the standard of planning is so poor as to be unprofessional. It is simply essential that planning for any precinct or suburb identify all necessary infrastructure as part of the plan and include space for everything before any rezoning. Once the apartments are zoned, it will be practically impossible to get the land for the schools and other community needs.
The government is in such a rush that they have produced a short-sighted, unprofessional plan that will make existing shortfalls worse. While the most serious issue is the total lack of infrastructure, there are also other serious problems in the government’s plan.
Location – extremely constrained by traffic
After the total lack of infrastructure, the next main problem with this plan is that the government’s consultants have picked a highly traffic-constrained location to massively increase density. George Street already grinds to a halt multiple times a day with traffic queues hundreds of metres long. This density goes far beyond any traffic plans ever contemplated for the neighbourhood. Meanwhile, the traffic analysis has the major flaw of only dealing with traffic up to 2026, when perhaps only half the total expected population will be living in the area – see the .
Area of increased density
Council resolution on new NSW government density plans
I put a motion at the February 2024 Council meeting which supported the intentions of the government’s announced plans, but criticised the major problems in how their plans would work. The motion, passed unanimously by all councillors, committed the council to working with the state government, but negotiating improvements to fix the issues in the plans.
Transport recommendations for North Strathfield
The transport recommendations of the Parramatta Road Study 2022 were a precondition for Parramatta Road Corridor Urban Transformation Strategy (PRCUTS) rezoning, which also includes North Strathfield and Concord West.
Next steps:
If you are concerned about this, you can send me an email with your concerns, and/or call me.
Here are my contact details:
Councillor Charles Jago
charles@cejago.com, 0403 902 613