Box Hill: Bruce St carpark to become high-rise towers with 73 affordable apartments
A 19-storey development will be built on a public carpark in Box Hill’s centre, to include more than 70 apartments for low to medium income-earners. Here’s a sneak peek at the plans.
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A 19-storey development set to take the place of a public carpark in Box Hill’s centre will include more than 70 apartments exclusively available to low to medium income-earners.
Whitehorse Council is selling the carpark at 2-4 Bruce St to a developer who will include the 73 affordable apartments in one of the two high-rise towers to be built at the site.
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The 19-storey and 10-storey towers will go up less than 500m from Box Hill Central, with 162 apartments, three office spaces, and a cafe in the first, and 73 one and two-bedroom affordable units in the second.
The development’s eco-friendly design will include greenery on the buildings’ exterior walls, a communal garden, solar panels, electric vehicle charging and will encourage people to share electric cars.
A total of 210 carparking spaces and 84 bicycle spaces will be provided, with most accessed from Elland Ave.
The council received 13 objections to the plans from neighbours concerned about overdevelopment, the impact on their amenity, and the 10 mature, medium to high value trees that will be cut down for the build.
When the council approved the development on February 25, Councillor Andrew Davenport said the design attempted to interface the emerging character of Box Hill’s centre with the single-storey dwellings to its north.
He said the building’s advantages would “outweigh the detriment surrounding residents may have”.
Councillor Blair Barker said the building would set a new design standard, calling it a “distinctive step away from the … neo-brutalist expressions” of the suburb’s “other unfortunate buildings”.
“It’s going to in many ways cover up probably Australia’s ugliest building, which is the ATO box”.
He said the greenery would improve the public realm of Bruce St and reflect the landscaping values of Whitehorse’s surrounding areas.
Councillor Andrew Munroe said residents living in social housing around the municipality would be relocated to the future apartments, where they would greatly benefit from access to facilities and public transport.
He said the location would better enable the low income earners, who were unlikely to have cars, to be mobile and integrate with the rest of the community.
“We certainly could develop this type of housing in the remote part of our city for a much cheaper rate,” he said.
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