11 October 2024 

In this Edition...

1.Urban Taskforce policy conference unpacks TOD policy

2. NSW apartment commencements collapse – while Victoria charges on… 

3. Notorious self-styled aesthetes, the Committee for Sydney – say they fear housing supply may come at the cost of a dead pot plant … wow!

...and much, much more.

4. Council go-slow on Leppington Station precinct 
5. Sydney Olympic Park- over station development
6.  Urban Taskforce and Mayor of Inner West agree on Parramatta Road – just get on with it!
7. More good news - more housing for Parramatta CBD
8. Quote of the week - Shaun Carney
9. Building regulations overreach adding to the costs and complexity of strata 
10. Upper House inquiry reports on inquiry into Biodiversity Conservation Bill
11. Central station “scar” may never heal
12. Urban Taskforce Conference 2024 - Drilling down on the details
13. Council watch
14. Members in the news

1. Urban Taskforce policy conference unpacks TOD policy

The Urban Taskforce annual policy conference – TODs: The Future or Failure? brought together a wide range of experts – property, infrastructure, finance and Government before a packed auditorium in Sydney.

The Minister for Planning and Public Places, the Hon Paul Scully MP, delivered the keynote speech for the conference and laid out the Minns Government’s plans for transport-oriented-development.

The Minister advised that there were over 7,000 submissions with vastly varying views on the TODs. Some wanted them expanded, some wanted more, some wanted greater housing yield, but some wanted quite the opposite on all of these fronts.

The Minister acknowledged the work of the Urban Taskforce and members while praising the work of Peter Achterstraat, the NSW Productivity and Equality Commissioner. The Minister confirmed that the Government was on track to finalise the planning pathway for the Accelerated Precincts (the Tier 1 TODs) as well as concluding each precinct plan before the end of the year (well before Christmas).

For much more on the Conference, including photos, see story 12

2. NSW apartment commencements collapse – while Victoria charges on… 

The ABS this week released housing commencement and completions data for the quarter up to June 2024.

The news is not good and shows the National Housing Accord almost dead-on-arrival even before it started.

What stood out most was the complete collapse in apartment commencements in NSW. A mere 14,741 apartments commenced in the 12 months to. To put it in perspective- in the same period to June 2019 there were 45,390 commencements.

Commencements are a window into the future  when it comes to actual housing competitions 2 to 3 years down the track.

And the future looks bleak….

It points to a concern that decision makers in NSW don’t do what the NSW Productivity Commissioner has said is critical … and that is get their heads around feasibility.

Higher finance and construction costs, labour shortages, the impact of interest rates, and increasing building commission and NCC red tape is impacting feasibility of property development. Yet we still see the cash strapped NSW Government come up with more and more ways to tax housing supply.

This approach needs to change. CEO Tom Forrest spoke with 10 News First on the need for reform to ramp up supply:

But it’s not like it's Mission Impossible.

Victoria shows that with political will and a pro-housing outlook, significant housing supply can be delivered. The same ABS data released this week confirms that Victoria delivered more 60,000 new dwelling completions over the 12 months to June. They are close to what they need under the Accord (the target for Victoria is 62,000 per year). And their pipeline is growing – with Victoria approving 10,000 more homes in the last 12 months than NSW according to data published this month by the ABS.

Victoria rubs it in

This is a key reason why Victoria has better housing affordability.

And this week’s data is a wake-up call for the Commonwealth. While they talk the talk, they are paying lip-service to the task at hand when it comes to housing supply. For the Commonwealth, this means bolstering infrastructure funding for the States embarking on planning reform.

Even Victoria, with all their success on planning approvals, is feeling the pinch when it comes to supporting infrastructure.  This is where the Commonwealth must help.

What is not acceptable is Federal Treasury “parking” the $3 billion New Home Bonus that will only be paid out in 2029 if the State’s meet their initial targets. This should be upfront and regular to incentivise the State’s to make bolder decisions around planning reform.

Completions are the metric by which the success or failure of the National Housing Accord will measured. While the national completion figures are bad (only 176,000 annual completions where 240,000 yearly completions are required under the Accord), NSW is even worse – a mere 46,479, where 76,000 are needed annually over the next 5 years.

Data does not lie, and for NSW it is dire.  

3. Notorious self-styled aesthetes, the Committee for Sydney – say they fear housing supply may come at the cost of a dead pot plant … wow!

The NSW Productivity and Equality Commissioner, Peter Achterstraat, recently issued a well thought out blueprint – the Review of Housing Supply Challenges and Policy Options NSW - to help solve the State’s deteriorating housing supply crisis.

Image republished due to popular demand

Feasibility of supply was central to the report’s recommendations - identifying and addressing factors that inhibit or kill off the supply of new housing.

Amongst the Report’s recommendations was one to relax the feasibility killing precepts of the NSW Apartment Design Guidelines around solar. Mr Achterstraat rightfully pointed out that these demands were restricting the number of apartments that could be delivered in the places people wanted to live.

This led to a backlash from the usual suspects but the Committee for Sydney went OTT!  

The Committee for Sydney seems to be in a state of apoplexy over the fact that people may be protected from the elements but at the shocking price of a dead pot plant during the winter months.

The Committee for Sydney has relegated itself to irrelevancy with their supercilious critique of the real issues facing many renters and would-be first home buyers in NSW. They appear to consciously go public, talking about the fate of pot plants, when we are faced with the economic and social catastrophe that is the housing supply crisis.

At the end of the day, the main game is about putting roofs over people’s heads. The market is best to determine the design of the apartment. As the Commissioner correctly states in his report “ let consumers decide how much solar access they want to pay for.”

You want a safe and secure home at the potential loss of an indoor pot plant – you should be able to decide – not be told what is best by the usual suspects who think they know best.

4. Council go-slow on Leppington Station precinct 

Urban Taskforce has often pointed out the precinct around Leppington station as a shocking example of everything that is wrong with the NSW Planning system.

 With a train station completed in early 2015  - the following decade has been a debacle.

The NSW Planning system obviously missed the memo on “build it and they will come” - with the precinct first being entirely sterilised through a high-rise commercial rezoning (for which there was no market appetite) and more recently a planning football kicked around between Camden and Liverpool Councils, and the Department of Planning.

Not to be outdone, the Regional Planning Panel recently rejected a proposal for almost 3,000 homes within walking distance of the station. While the proposal had strategic merit, the Panel got bogged down in site specifics, a requirement sneakily inserted into planning regime by the former Government.  The legacy of this continues to impact on rezoning applications where the strategic planners simply missed the mark.

Recently we received an email from the Councils in relation to Leppington:

In the midst of a housing supply crisis, the Councils are saying we’ll work through all this and get back to the community within 12 months!

This is a site crying out for mixed used, high density development. Yet between them, ably assisted by DPHI, Liverpool and Camden Councils have thwarted, dithered and delayed progress on what really should already be a vibrant, well connect community in Western Sydney.

This precinct should be a Tier One TOD with a SSDA pathway.

Both the Daily Telegraph and the SMH have covered the debacle at Leppington – yet all we get is a bureaucratic shrug of the shoulders.

Leppington continues to be a lesson of how Councils and DPHI get things wrong – threatening jobs and housing.

Leppington – world class infrastructure (well … a station and a massive multi-deck car park, surrounded by cow paddocks

5. Sydney Olympic Park- over station development

The Minns Government this week announced its plans for development over the Sydney Olympic Park Metro. A further 190 apartments were added to above station development, part of mixed-use development over the new metro.

Wow – an extra 190 apartments on top of a multi-billion dollar metro! The Victorians will be taking notes!!! (see story 2)

It may be boring but it is delivering some housing and jobs

6. Urban Taskforce and Mayor of Inner West agree on Parramatta Road – just get on with it!

Last week we reported on the Minister for Planning Paul Scully’s decision to takeover the rezoning of 11 sites across NSW, including the Inner West component of the beleaguered Parramatta Road Corridor.

This is a good step in the right direction and should lend some forward thrust to sites that have been bogged down for too long.

The revitalisation of Parramatta Road has dragged on now for more than a decade. The inclusion of the corridor is welcome.

Parramatta Road – a blight rather than a boulevard

We note this week that Mayor of Inner West, Darcy Byrne, fresh from his empathic victory in the local council elections in September, and newly reanointed as Mayor of Inner West Council, has agreed with our recommendation (published as part of our 10-point infill development plan in September) of a development authority overseeing the rezoning of proposals along Parramatta Road for housing and jobs up and down the corridor.

With the Greens and NIMBYs flatlining in the Inner West, it is good to see the YIMBY Mayor take a statesmanlike approach to finally sorting out the “shame of Sydney” that is Parramatta Road.

We suggest the new body be called the “Parramatta Road Actual Development Authority” (… or PRADA !)  - now there’s some inner west chic for you! 😊

The SMH noted our support for the Government taking the whip hand when it comes to rezonings of strategic precincts and corridors

*Please note, the below link may be paywall protected

7.    More good news – more housing for Parramatta CBD

Another good result arising from the Minns  Government’s new SSD pathway is at Fitzwilliam St Parramatta , right opposite Parramatta train station, where an extra 450 homes will now be delivered instead of commercial space thanks to the Government’s planning intervention.

This is a positive response to market realities, where office space continues to struggle for tenants.

Urban Property Group will now amend its proposal and deliver a second residential tower.

More residents will enliven the Parramatta CBD.

This type of intervention is needed in other key CBD locations across Sydney, like North Sydney.

*Please note, the below link may be paywall protected

8. Quote of the week

We couldn’t go past this contribution from the SMH’s Shaun Carney:

9. Building regulations overreach adding to the costs and complexity of strata 

Best practice in regulatory design must be about ensuring any regulation is focussed on where risk lies.

A case in point of regulatory overreach is the Design and Building Practitioners Act 2020, which lumped small strata buildings of two storeys in with major Class 2 developments. This is impacting costs of repair and impacting ordinary apartment owners, a point singled out by CEO of Urban Taskforce Tom Forrest when talking to the AFR.

The review of the DBP and the proposed new Building legislation is a perfect opportunity to iron out these kinks in the NSW legislative framework for apartments.

This poorly thought through legislation has massively added to the cost, time and complexity of anyone wanting the renovate or repair an older apartment.  This is having a big impact.

More and more people will be living in apartments as we move forward. The Government needs to ensure the regulation of apartment living is commensurate with the risk. Right now, the Building Commission has gone too far.

*Please note, the below link may be paywall protected

10. Upper House inquiry reports on inquiry into Biodiversity Conservation Bill

11. Central station “scar” may never heal

While many of the current problems with the NSW Planning system can be fairly sheeted home to the former Government, they did better when it came to a vision for Sydney.

Not to be…

The Minns Government has now scrapped work on a platform over central station  lines which would have healed the scar between Surry Hills and Broadway.

CEO of Urban Taskforce lamented the length of time taken by the Minns Government to make this call.  Private investors make decisions based on the stated intentions of government. You could understand why this announcement might come in the period immediately following an election, given its quoted cost to government of $6 billion, but surely they did not stumble across this last week?

The abandonment of the project will no-doubt impact the renewal of the Central tech precinct which has already seen considerable private sector investment.

*Please note, the below link may be paywall protected

12. Urban Taskforce Conference 2024 - Drilling down on the details

The Minister was followed by Dr Tony Richards, Senior Adviser at the Digital Finance Cooperative Research Centre and former Head of Economic Research and Economic Analysis for the RBA, who provided a blunt appraisal from an urban economics perspective.

Tony belled the cat when it came to the NIMBY notion that high end development does nothing for affordability.  He said this view was simply wrong and it must be called out. Too often the planning system and planners in academia ignore or are blind to basic economic realities and this results in enormous damage.

Instead, Dr Richards explained the “filtering theory” where all supply ultimate leads to more affordable housing. Tony’s presentation concluded that historically planning has blocked the densification of housing where people want to live – scarcity benefitting those who currently live in the inner city.

This is to the benefit of older, wealthy, educated people with time on their hands to enable them to use the planning system to block housing supply.

Dr Richard’s talk was a perfect segue into the presentation by the Chief Executive of Infrastructure NSW - Tom Gellibrand, who reassured the audience that for the period of the Housing Accord, infill infrastructure capacity was sufficient to deliver the housing numbers needed. There is no excuse for any Council to reject the housing targets that the Minns Government has set them.

The one policy that was working - the infill affordable housing incentive – had been switched off for the TODs  - Aras was clear that this was a policy error and called for it to be brought back for TOD zones ASAP!

Her preferred approach was to hold the axe, but not to drop it.  The fact that there is a specific sub-committee of Cabinet overseeing housing supply and infrastructure was, according to Secretary Fishburn, as strong incentive for all agencies to get on board.

Having worked in the private sector for both Lendlease and Mirvac, Leanne is an experienced place making planner and that came through in her discussion on the panel.

The second half of the conference featured soon to be departing Sydney editor of the SMH, Michael Koziol.

Flipping the tables, Tom interview Michael and asked him what he would do if he was Planning Minister for a day. The response – do a lot less Planning, to simplify the framework and deliver housing more quickly. He said that he found it impossible to explain to readers why there was such delay between a rezoning and new homes being built.  He confessed that the torture of the complexity of a “gateway” process was a creation the SMH did not have enough pages to detail!

And he agreed with Urban Taskforce calls to bring back the “zhoosh” in Sydney!

Michael said that bread and butter issues will always dominate decision making in a tough fiscal environment, but the city of Sydney risked losing its night time economy and becoming bland.

Michael questioned the Government decision to cut the West Metro short and not extend it south east to the SCG and beyond.  “Why terminate a Metro under the botanical gardens?” he asked – great question!

Michael then hosted the afternoon session, leading a fantastic panel discussion.

He told the audience he felt liberated from accountability as he plans for his imminent departure for the USA to cover all the excitement of the election and beyond.

While the Australian Architecture Association President Tone Wheeler described himself as the outlier of the conference, he again expressed frustration with the lack of concrete action when it came to housing. Tone said that there should be a lot more TOD’s and they should be based on corridors, not just stations.

TOD precincts should be running down the ribbons of high streets, along the bus corridors of Military Rd, Parramatta Rd, Liverpool Rd and Canterbury Rd that much of Sydney was built around. He said that the Transport planners had let Sydney down by failing to connect the Metros to the major centres of blue-collar employment, making a special plea for the extension of the Metro West from Westmead to Wetherill Park.

Tone called for 3 storey development in areas serviced by regular bus routes. The planning and building regulation system has failed to cater for the need for urban density and Tone was explicit in saying that the work on TODs to date, were a failure – not because he opposed them – but because they failed to create choice and there were far too few.

He had a none-to-subtle shot at the Minister for Building, Anoulack Chanthivong, for his proposal to dump the NSW Architects Act which had existed since 1921, treating the profession of architecture the same as plumbers! 

Urban Taskforce suspect the Minister (and the Premier) do not fully realise the fight ahead!

Deputy Secretary Gibson said the team had been pleased that the first DAs under the TOD tier 2 scheme were already rolling in and this bodes well for the program.

In good news for many in the room, Monica stated that greenfield housing has a huge role to play when it comes to meeting the short to medium term housing targets.

Comment

A packed audience gave positive feedback in terms of the breadth of issues and perspectives covered throughout the afternoon, though there remained some nervousness over the apparent lack of appreciation for the size of the task and the extent of the housing supply crisis.

There is a real appetite from industry to build on the initial lead provided by the Minns Government. We need to maximise the opportunities presented by the TOD program, capitalise on the massive investment in infrastructure like the Metros, and deliver the housing and jobs promised by transport-oriented development.

To best do that – the private sector needs to be closely involved.

Are TODs the future or failure? 

TODs have the potential to be a success – but Government needs to keeping pushing and expanding the program

Our thanks to all those involved in another successful conference. Minister Paul Scully, Planning Secretary Kiersten Fishburn, Deputy Secretary Monica Gibson, CEO of Infrastructure NSW Tom Gellibrand, Dr Tony Richards, President of AIA Tone Wheeler, Coronation Property’s Aras Labutis,  Simon  Hunter from TfNSW Leanne Boyle from Sydney Metro, Mark Tait from Investa and the SMH’s Michael Koziol.

Finally, our thanks to Coronation Property for sponsoring this successful, incisive and enjoyable policy conference.

13. Council Watch

Woollahra

Plans for the tallest building above Edgecliff Station have been lodged with the State Government. Liberal Councillor Sean Carmichael’s response – why don’t they clip a few floors off it?

Reason? – it shouldn’t dwarf any other nearby building.

Cr Carmichael was elected the Deputy Mayor of Woollahra, with fellow Liberal Sarah Swan as Mayor. 

Another reason why these types of redevelopments, above strategic rail corridors, should go nowhere near councils.

Edgecliff Station should be a TOD 1 accelerated precinct.

14. Members in the news

*Please note these articles may be paywall protected

“…An alternative plan for the Central Station precinct put forward by architecture firm Bates Smart proposed a large area of green space should be built on the deck over the rail lines, with towers on either side instead…  read more...

To read more, click here:                         Sydney Morning Herald, 7 October 

“…Prices for newer apartments could jump by more than 20 per cent by the end of 2026, fuelled by lower interest rates and shrinking supply, according to CBRE… read more... 

To read more, click here:                     AFR, 7 October

“…In its largest individual acquisition deal, ALAND has bought the parcel of land at 189 Macquarie St from dVT Group … read more... 

To read more, click here:                     Parramatta Advertiser, 8 October

“…Lendlease will partner with Nippon Steel Kowa Real Estate to deliver a new $500 million, 499-unit build-to-rent tower in Melbourne’s Docklands… …read more... 

To read more, click here:                    AFR, 9 October

“…Before the government intervention, developer Urban Property Group had received state government approval to build a 350-apartment, build-to-rent tower along with a commercial office tower on the Parramatta site…read more... 

To read more, click here              AFR, 9 October

“…Walker Corporation has unveiled plans for a twin tower mixed-use development within the Sunshine Coast’s emerging $2.5-billion CBD at Maroochydore…read more... 

To read more, click here              The Urban Developer, 10 October