New 37-townhouse plan for Hackney Rd Sanitarium factory to go to development after first attempt failed

EARLY this year residents reacted angrily to a plan for 42 homes at an old Weet-Bix factory, saying it’d turn their eastern suburb into a “ghetto”. A revised bid is now in and you can take a look at the proposal.

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A NEW plan for 37 townhouses on the Hackney Sanitarium factory site is likely to be approved next week after talks resulted in a design the developer says addresses earlier criticisms of the project.

In January, Hackney residents hit out at a bid to build 42 homes on the site, saying it would turn their home suburb into a “ghetto” and a “slum”.

The new design has five fewer units than a previous proposal rejected by Norwood, Payneham & St Peters’ development panel in March because of concerns about a lack of open space and the similar design of each house.

Designer Elvio Ferrara said the new plan “addressed everything the panel criticised”.

He met with residents in April and believed the new design also met most of their concerns.

Developer Zachariasz Baran and the council went through an Environment, Resources and Development Court mediation process to come up with the new plan.

Cars will now enter from Hackney Rd and Hatswell St rather than the narrow Cambridge St.

Two rows of townhouses have been realigned so they are facing north and south rather than east and west.

Mr Ferrara said the new plan also included larger blocks with larger backyards and had more diversity in its design.

It has four large townhouses facing Hackney Rd, eight row houses facing Cambridge St, eight more on Hatswell St and 17 smaller dwellings in the middle of the 8250sq m block.

Cambridge St resident Andrew VanderSluys, who called the previous plan a “concrete ghetto”, said neighbours appreciated the developer speaking to them and coming up with a better design.

He said there had been a “serious effort to do something far more appealing”.

However, he said concerns remained about extra traffic on Cambridge St.

“There will be 40-50 cars that will need access all the time,” Mr VanderSluys said.

“Cambridge St really is a one-lane street because the parking is permanently full.”

Cambridge and Hatswell streets provide access to St Peter’s College.

Some of the units on the Hackney Rd site have already been sold off-the-plan ahead of the expected approval on Monday.

Sanitarium produced Weet-Bix at the site until 2010 and put it up for sale in 2013.