A major Sydney development has been put on hold, due
to the economic downturn, putting more pressure on the state’s rising
unemployment levels.
Frasers Property, the developer of the $1.3 billion dollar plan for
the former Carlton United Brewery site at Broadway, has decided to put
off construction until the global economy recovers.
Levelling work at the site is still going on, but the Government is
keen for it not to turn into another of the “black holes” which plagued
Sydney during the financial melt-down in Asia, and during the early
1990s recession.
A spokesman for Planning Minister Kristina Keneally says any
applications to excavate the site will be refused unless construction
is ready to begin immediately after.
As recently as February, the state Government was extolling the virtues of the project’s potential to create jobs in the city.
Ms Keneally says the site still has the potential to generate
thousands of jobs, and is optimistic that any delays will be minor.
“The CUB redevelopment site was always going to be staged over a
decade, and it does have potential to create some ongoing 5,500 jobs
and some 12,000 construction jobs,” she said.
“Now construction was due to start early in 2010, and the Government
would certainly welcome work getting under way as close as possible to
that time frame.”
One City of Sydney Councillor is worried that the postponement might
signal the return of “missing tooth syndrome”, where many sites sat
empty during the building bust of the late 1980s and early ’90s.
Councillor John McInerney says the City learnt from the problem, and
if planning controls for the Broadway site had been left with Council
there would have been contingencies in place.
“The ideal thing would have been to have some sort of funding that
allows the frontage to be temporarily built, so that you get activity
along there,” he said.
“Some form of landscaping in the central area, rather than just
having a dust bowl that becomes annoying and potentially dangerous. All
of these things I would have hoped the Department of Planning have got
under their belt, but as I say, I’m a little pesimistic about that.”
Aside from its developments in Australia, Singapore-based Frasers
Property has large investments in that recession ravaged city-state, as
well as the depressed UK and New Zealand property markets.
Source:
www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/04/17/2545554.htm?section=business