Macquarie Park development drive ‘unfair’ on residents
This suburb in Sydney’s northwest is in the midst of a development explosion — and residents fear for its future.
Northern District Times
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It is the suburb where up to 15,000 new dwellings could be in place by 2031 and the population is expected to be the fastest growing in Sydney’s north over the next two decades.
And for long-time Macquarie Park residents like Col Bailey, the growing pains are already biting hard.
“I have lived in this area for 59 years and it’s unbelievable how overcrowded Macquarie Park and North Ryde have already become,” said Mr Bailey, 67, who lives near Lane Cove National Park.
“And there are thousands of more units, people and cars still to come here; I just wonder how it’ll all function in the future?
“You can’t keep putting all these extra people in here without the quality of life for local residents suffering. It’s not fair to society.”
The Greater Sydney Commission predicts there will be an additional 51,700 residents in the Ryde local government area by 2036, due to various urban renewal projects at Macquarie University, Macquarie shopping centre and Ivanhoe Estate.
It says an extra 92,000 homes will be required in the northern district over the next two decades to accommodate 196,000 more residents.
It also anticipates Macquarie Park will become the largest non-CBD office market in Australia and the nation’s fourth biggest commercial precinct by 2030, with an extra 21,000 jobs.
The massive development push in Macquarie Park dates back to 2012, when the State Government committed $50 million to its new Urban Activation Program (UAP) to “unclog the arteries blocking housing development” in NSW.
“Not only does this provide certainty for investors; it also provides certainty to communities who can now feel confident that this growth will be supported with the appropriate upgrades in infrastructure and services,” the then-Planning Minister Brad Hazzard said at the time.
In 2014, the government released a Herring Road planning proposal, where the precinct would allow for residential towers up to 120m high and 5400 new dwellings by 2031.
Ryde Council strongly disputed the housing target, predicting the number of dwellings in the precinct could swell to 15,000 and the plans were not supported by enough open space, schools, childcare centres, libraries, cultural facilities and traffic measures.
The government hit back, claiming that council’s forecast “assumes every site is developed to its theoretical maximum capacity”.
Despite only 30 per cent community support for the plans, the Department of Planning pressed ahead with the Herring Road UAP, now known as the Macquarie University Priority Precinct.
It’s been followed by plans, released last year, for another 3500 units at a redeveloped Ivanhoe Estate.
Mr Bailey, who ran a pub at The Rocks for many years before his retirement, said the extra development was putting an “enormous strain” on local residents.
“The residents have been overlooked in all the government’s long-term planning,” he said.
“It’s been a snatch for whacking people into a certain area and saying ‘that’ll work because we’ve got a train station and buses here’.
“It takes people so long to get anywhere in traffic now.
“The irony of putting more people into local communities is it becomes harder to know your neighbours.”
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