Sydney skyline to be transformed with two new towers

The City of Sydney has endorsed a plan to increase maximum building heights with two towers set to be the tallest in the city.

Conceptual art of what the Pitt St precinct will look like. The proposal for the precinct is for two towers above 70m. Picture: Dexus/City of Sydney

Sydney’s CBD is soaring to new heights with plans for two new skyscrapers that will eclipse the city’s tallest buildings and dramatically transform the skyline.

The City of Sydney council has endorsed proposed changes to planning rules which will increase the maximum height and floor space of new buildings.

Lord Mayor Clover Moore said the proposal is in line with the Central Sydney planning strategy, a blueprint for height and floor space growth – the most significant review of planning in the city centre in over 45 years.

The changes will increase the maximum permitted building height on in a precinct on Pitt St to 310m. This would be marginally higher than Sydney Tower - currently the tallest structure in the city.

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Sydney’s CBD has lagged Melbourne due to restrictive building heights.

The proposal would be for a 70-storey commercial building at 56-60 Pitt St. Included in the proposal would be plans for public spaces and a pedestrian through-site link connecting Pitt St to Spring and Gresham streets.

Another proposal to enable a second 300m-plus tower is also being finalised before public consultation.

This second tower would be nearby at 1-25 O’Connell St and would be 319m. The 71-storey skyscraper and adjoining development will provide 150,000 square metres of commercial floor space.

The space would include a public through-site link and precincts logistics hub, a shared loading dock for businesses in the precinct and adaptive reuse of heritage buildings.

Both sites are located in the northern tower precinct of Central Sydney favoured by financial, legal, property and technology sectors, according to the City of Sydney.

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Photomontage of concept development at Pitt Street Image: Transport, Heritage and Planning Committee

“If we want Sydney to maintain its status as a global city and economic powerhouse, its vital that we safeguard economic floor space whilst allowing residential development to continue in the city centre,” Ms Moore said in a City of Sydney release.

The strategy works to allow the skyline to rise at the same time as ensuring sunlight continues to reach popular public spaces such as Hyde Park and the Royal Botanic Garden.

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Looking through the trees of Sydney's Royal Botanic Gardens towards the towers of the Central Business District

“It was the product of three years of deep research by City staff, who worked block by block, carefully examining the way our city works and where sunlight falls,” Ms Moore said.

According to Ray White Head of Research Vanessa Rader, building skyward is strategic and practical to grow in the city centre.

“Sydney historically has had lower height restrictions in order to keep Sydney Tower as the highest landmark,” she said.

“You look at other cities like Melbourne – they have much higher buildings.

“Sydney Tower is a bit of an ageing building now when you look at the new buildings that are coming up. Just look at Barangaroo and Crown – its great to see that we are competing with the rest of the world in terms of having these landmark structures.”

Crown at Barangaroo is one of the tallest buildings in Sydney Picture: NewsWire/Bianca De Marchi

Ms Rader said the development around the CBD and existing public transport also creates hubs which take a leaf out of international cities transport orientated, high density developments.

“We are probably going to go through a period of seeing consolidation of sites – like the one on Pitt Street,” she said.

“A lot of kind of smaller, older style buildings or secondary buildings consolidated into these larger sites in order to cater to these new, beautiful and premium buildings.”

Originally published as Sydney skyline to be transformed with two new towers