Old Julia Farr Centre, now Highgate Park, at Fullarton to become retirement, assisted living precinct with hundreds of homes
It’s sat empty and derelict for years – now the old Julia Farr Centre will become home to hundreds of retirees and others, with the remarkable plans released.
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The site of the former Julia Farr Centre at Fullarton would be transformed into a living precinct with accommodation for hundreds of residents as the full scale of the proposal is revealed.
The site’s owners have proposed to construct 16 two-storey dwellings, 72 retirement apartments in a five-storey building, and a mix of 56 residential apartments and 159 assisted living beds in redevelopment of the existing, 10-storey building.
In 2024 the state government sold the 2.3ha former disability accommodation site, now named Highgate Park, for $42m to two national healthcare and retirement living operators, Living Choice and Opal HealthCare.
Living Choice had purchased the centre’s west block in 2011, opening Living Choice Fullarton in December 2014.
Under the owners’ new proposal, the ten-storey Highgate building onsite would be partially demolished to allow for 159 supported accommodation beds developed and operated by Opal Healthcare, and 56 residential apartments developed by Living Choice.
A new five-storey building would accommodate 72 retirement-living apartments, with amenities including a function room, gym and pickleball courts.
Sixteen two-storey dwellings, including 14 townhouses, would be built at Highgate St, Fisher St and a proposed new laneway, accessible from Fisher St, to be owned by Unley Council.
A Living Choice spokeswoman said its vision was for the land to become “a high-end residential, retirement and aged-care precinct … sympathetic architecturally to the existing built form and surrounding community”.
Planning documents said the owners intended to complete the development within five years from the date of approval, in three construction stages beginning with the apartments in the ten-storey building.
The development would include 307 carparking spaces and would require the removal of nine significant trees and 34 regulated trees.
The site’s chapel, Round House and Gosse Building – which are not local heritage places – would be demolished.
A spokesman for Unley Council said it wanted new public space at the site.
“The council has made clear to Living Choice and Opal Healthcare of its aspirations
to realise new public space as part of the site’s redevelopment,” he said. “It remains in
discussions with the new owners.”
The council is responsible for approving the new plans.
The site dates to 1878 when Julia Farr founded a committee to focus on the needs of people with disabilities.
Before its sale in 2024, the site was owned by a Trust with the Minister for Human Services Nat Cook as the sole trustee.
It was home to more than 800 people at its peak in the 1970s, but by the time of its closure in 2020, just six residents remained and its derelict buildings had become an infamous hotspot for “urban explorers” and ghost hunters.
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