Residents, shop owners speak out against council’s plan to convert carparks to housing
Residents and shop owners in Sydney’s inner west have fired up over a partly “confidential” council plan locals claim will ruin the area.
Residents and shop owners in Sydney’s inner west have spoken out against the local council’s impending plan to convert public carparks into much-needed affordable housing – warning it will decimate businesses and deter people from living in or visiting the area.
Inner West Council is set to transform carparks across four town centres, including on Garners Ave in Marrickville and Marion St in Leichhardt, into 200 affordable homes for essential workers, more than doubling the existing stock of 94.
The proposal would also eradicate the largest cost of any housing development – land, which the council would retain ownership of.
“We think that by using our public assets, in this case, car parks and depots to be repurposed as a different public asset, housing, to meet the crisis, we can make a real difference,” Inner West Council Mayor Darcy Byrne has said.
“This is a way that councils across NSW can contribute to real solutions to the housing crisis.”
But a growing chorus of Marrickville locals and business owners have voiced their opposition to the plan ahead of a council meeting to discuss it this month, arguing it’s already impossible to find a park, let alone once housing is there.
“The impact it’s going to have to the local strip is going to be severe,” Inner West councillor and business owner Victor Macri told A Current Affair on Saturday.
Mr Macri argued the proposal was at odds with increased housing density in the inner city, and would cause retailers to suffer as a result of shoppers going elsewhere due to a lack of parking spots in “the epicentre of the strip”.
“It’s causing a lot of anxiety in the community, in the business community and the residents, because they also use this carpark as their overflow,” Mr Macri said.
“Once it gets too hard to come here and park, people will look for easier places to go.”
He also questioned why the council’s final list of car parks it intends to convert had not been shared with the public.
“Why is this confidential? It shouldn’t be confidential,” Mr Macri said.
“It should’ve actually been consulted with the community first, see what they think, rather than jump two steps ahead.”
While Mr Byrne insisted the move “will provide a new customer base for our businesses”, Marrickville Chamber of Commerce member Simon Konstantinidis told the program the council’s proposal “is completely and diametrically opposed to providing such access”.
“We need as much access to the shopping centre as possible,” Mr Konstantinidis said.
“We all think that it’s a very bad idea. Removing carparks is removing amenity and access to the residents, to the people that come to the shopping centre, to the people that need to go to doctors, they need to get their bloods done, people that go to the pubs.”
One woman searching for a parking spot echoed the sentiment the housing would make life more difficult to locals, particularly those who are less mobile.
“I’ve just taken my mate over and he’s got bad knees and stuff, so you’ve (already) got to walk all the way up the bloody street,” she said.
One staff member at Mitre 10 told ACA businesses were struggling “because we don’t have enough parking for our customers already”.
“There’s a few parking (spots) around the area, but just them getting rid of that carpark, there’s no (doubt) the businesses around them will suffer,” he said.
“The area’s already too dense. If anything, we need more carparks than what we already have.”
Housing advocacy group Shelter NSW has said the need for proposals like the Inner West Council’s was “urgent”.
“Land in the inner city is at a premium and there’s often a challenge in finding available and affordable sites that can be used for genuinely affordable housing,” a spokesperson told The Daily Telegraph last month.
Mr Byrne told The Sydney Morning Herald his local government area was at the “epicentre” of the crisis.
“There is a generation who grew up here, but were forced out because they had no hope of purchasing a home and can never afford the astronomical rents,” he said.
“If we can deliver housing on three to four sites, and achieve, say, 200 units, that would be a ten-fold increase on the social housing stock that council controls.”