City’s highest density
headed for Waterloo
The Waterloo
South public housing redevelopment will become the densest residential part of
the City of Sydney if the NSW Government approves the City of Sydney Council’s
(CoS) planning proposal made public on 10 February 2021. CoS has decided it
needs to increase the density on its earlier proposal to match the density
proposed by the NSW Government’s Land and Housing Corporation (LAHC).
To match the
LAHC proposed yield (number of units), the CoS plan has three 27-30 storey
high-rises to the south of the site and up to 13 storey buildings along George
Street and fronting parks. The balance of the site is mostly eight storeys. The
CoS proposal covers a slightly larger land area with less open space and fewer
apartments per building than LAHC. CoS says its proposal will deliver better
street level amenity with less wind and almost three times the amount of deep
soil plantings. The smaller park in LAHC’s plan has shrunk in size, but the
sunlight access has improved. Council is proposing a different street layout,
which it says will be more accessible and allow better sunlight, and is
concentrating retail at street level along a widened George Street.
CoS argues this
increased level of development can be supported and that its planning proposal
has made many changes to the LAHC proposal to deliver the amenity necessary to
support such a dense development. The Central Sydney Planning Committee (CSPC)
has supported the CoS proposal, however the NSW Government Architect, who is a
member of the CSPC, questioned if the density was too high.
High density
creates liveability challenges for any community, but as 30 per cent of the
community who will be living at this site will be social housing tenants, many
with high and complex needs, the question is if the density proposed is
appropriate for them. In initial CoS briefings, the conflict between the need
for social housing units at ground floor and those locations also usually being
best suited for retail was identified. A key issue for discussion must be the
high density proposed and how this density will affect social housing tenants.
The current
proposal is only for a portion of the estate. This portion has a park the size
of Redfern Park within it. What happens in Waterloo South will set the
precedent for the central and northern precincts, which with a similar built
form, without a large park, are likely to be even higher density.
A built form comparison
If the density
is accepted, two different built form solutions with similar yields, community
facilities and open space can be compared. LAHC proposed a high-rise solution
with 12 towers between 15 and 32 storeys, CoS is now proposing a mid-rise
solution with three towers of up to 30 storeys, if LAHC meet its conditions.
Both LAHC and CoS believe their proposal deliver the best amenity, although
that might change once LAHC reviews the CoS proposal.
CoS held a
Design Challenge Review of its Waterloo South proposals involving some
prominent urban designers and planners who preferred the CoS proposal. Neither
LAHC nor Turners, its architects, attended the event to present or argue the
merits of the LAHC proposal. Turners had rejected a medium rise solution for
the development in its study for LAHC. Exploring the alternative proposals for
this site would make a good discussion session for the Planning Institute of
Australia or one of the Universities and might spark further ideas and
improvements.
Affordable Housing
Another key
area in contention is the proportion of floor space for different tenure mixes.
CoS has reduced its initial call for 50% social housing and now agrees with
Communities Plus’s 30% social housing. CoS wants 20% affordable housing with
the balance 50% private. LAHC has only committed to 5% affordable housing
leaving 65% private housing. CoS has said that 10% of the floor space should be
dedicated Aboriginal Affordable Housing.
CoS suggests
some changes in delivery and funding models that will help the NSW Government
deliver the affordable housing increase it is seeking. At Council Committee on
February 15 Councillor Philip Thalis argued that the CoS proposal is not unprecedented
as LAHC previously met a similar unit mix in Bay Street Glebe, which is a
complex development predating the current Communities Plus model. Financial
viability and the willingness of the NSW Government to top up any short fall in
self-funding will be a key to whether the CoS plan will be delivered.
CoS recognises
that LAHC is a ‘non-funded’ organisation which is required to ‘self-fund’ from
the redevelopment of its current land holdings. The report to Council goes on
to say “Nevertheless, the City argues for increased investment of government
investment into the provision of affordable and social housing in this precinct
to improve social and economic outcomes”.
The NSW
Government has not yet responded to the Redfern Waterloo Aboriginal Affordable Housing
Campaign’s request for all developments on government-controlled land in
Redfern Waterloo to deliver 10% Aboriginal affordable housing. CoS’s proposal
supports that request. That request should be funded on a whole of government
basis, not necessarily by LAHC.
If the
Aboriginal affordable housing was excluded from LAHC funding, LAHC could
undertake to supply 10% affordable housing in line with the top end of the
Greater Sydney Commission range of 5-10% rather than at bottom of that range
currently. On an inner city site, this might be doable. It relies however on
the NSW Government being prepared to deliver dedicated Aboriginal housing, as
there is no current mechanism for Council to force this under existing planning
law.
REDWatch,
housing advocates and public tenants have argued against the current NSW
Government policy for LAHC’s Communities Plus program that social housing land
is sold off to fund new social and affordable housing. CoS’s planning proposal
minimises the loss of government owned land to private housing and seeks to
maximise the amount of social and affordable housing generated under current
NSW government policies. The government is however still selling off scarce inner city public housing land to fund renewal
of its social housing rather than investing in social housing as essential
infrastructure.
Planning Proposal is
highly conditioned
CoS seems to
have made a calculation that by narrowing the gap between what LAHC wants and
what CoS has proposed under its best-case outcome, that LAHC and the NSW
Government might deliver, or go closer to delivering, CoS’s preferred outcome.
To encourage
LAHC to deliver CoS’s preferred housing mix and built form, CoS has conditioned
its proposal for the increased floor-space. To get any increase in floor space
over what it is currently entitled, LAHC has to meet CoS targets for social and
affordable housing, as well as meeting CoS’s proposed levels of non-residential
floor space and community facilities. LAHC also needs to exceed the Building
Sustainability Index (BASIX) requirements for water and energy by agreed
amounts and enter into arrangements with CoS over publicly accessible public
space.
Unless LAHC
meets all conditions it would not be entitled to build the increased floor
space CoS has proposed. CoS has also proposed a separate incentive for a 10%
increase in floor space if LAHC or private owners go through a design
excellence process. Both conditions need to be met by LAHC to get the number of
units it is seeking.
There is no
study on the financial viability of the proposed controls in the documents
released. LAHC argues that cutting the number of high-rise buildings will lower
the income from the redevelopment leaving less available to cover the costs of
CoS’s higher requirements and the increased social housing units under its
self-funding obligations from state government.
Some private
landowners have also suggested that the proposed uplift for privately owned
sites is not sufficient to encourage development of their sites given the proposed
loss of parts of their site for road widening or public access. Private owners
will also be obliged to make an affordable housing contribution of 9% of any
new floor space on their land.
Department approval
needed
While CoS would
be encouraged by the support shown by state government appointees at the CSPC,
the planning proposal has to be approved by the Department of Planning Industry
and Environment (DPIE) before it goes on exhibition. As there are, still some
key differences between LAHC (a part of DPIE) and CoS, approval by DPIE of the
current CoS proposal cannot be assumed.
The NSW
Government through DPIE gave CoS planning control
for this site in November 2019. CoS says DPIE was aware of its alternative
proposal and views before giving it planning control. However, as local
government is subject to state government control, what the state government
giveth it can also taketh away.
As the
“Gateway” process for changing planning controls is run by DPIE, if DPIE is not
in favour of a proposal, DPIE does not have to take planning controls away from
CoS to change the proposal. Initially this would be through negotiation with
CoS, but if agreement cannot be reached, DPIE can present its own proposal for
CoS to exhibit. The CoS motion for submitting the planning proposal to DPIE
says if there are major changes, then the DPIE proposal will come back for
Council consideration rather than the DPIE proposal going straight to
exhibition.
In early
February 2021, government decided to allow LAHC Development Applications (DA)
(the next stage for Waterloo after rezoning) with a value over $100M to be
decided by DPIE as State Significant (SS) Developments rather than by councils.
To cover the possibility of DPIE determining the Waterloo South SSDA stage,
Council had to produce a Design Guide as well as a Draft Development Control
Plan. The NSW Government Architect praised the CoS Design Guide at the CSPC.
Another
potential problem identified by Council in preparing its proposal is that the
old RWA contributions plan still exists, so the RWA fund, rather than CoS,
would get contributions from Waterloo South. As a result, CoS is asking DPIE to
wind up the old RWA Contribution Plan. RWA also had an Affordable Housing
Contribution plan that could fund affordable housing in Waterloo South.
Approximately $40Mnow sits within Infrastructure NSW primarily made up of the
affordable housing contributions from the Central Park development.
REDWatch Conclusion
REDWatch also
needs to restate its position that it cannot support any proposal for the
redevelopment of public housing in Waterloo unless a robust Human Services Plan
accompanies it. While a Waterloo human services “Collaborative” was started at
the end of last year to develop an action plan we have a long way to go before
there is a Human Services Plan that would sit alongside a high density plan for
the physical redevelopment of the Waterloo Estate.
I am reminded
of the old African proverb that says when the elephants fight the grass gets
trampled and when the elephants make love, the grass gets trampled. We are sure
there is much more of the Waterloo public housing saga to run and irrespective
of what the elephants get up to, we remain to be convinced that the public
tenant grassroots will get any real say in what happens nor have any guarantee
that their lives will improve as a result.
Further Reading
This analysis
has skimmed over the detail that Council and LAHC have provided and picked out
the issues that are considered most important. The documents are complex and it
is possible we have over simplified or misinterpreted some items so the reader
is encouraged to read the Council and LAHC documents and form their own view.
REDWatch
suggest that for more information on Council’s proposal and its interactions
with LAHC’s proposal that you read the main paper presented to the CoS Transport,
Heritage and Planning Committee on February 15.
The main Council document is Public
Exhibition – Planning Proposal – Waterloo Estate (South) – Sydney Local
Environmental Plan 2012 Amendment, item 2. PDF 9 MB. You can see more
information, including a fly through and a coming Council presentation, on
Council’s website at Planning
proposal: Waterloo estate (south). The main LAHC document is Attachment
B2 Planning Proposal Report – LaHC, item 2. PDF 10 MB. In all 67
documents have been placed on the Council’s
meeting website including all the support studies undertaken by LAHC.