Federal Labor minister Michelle Rowland has asked for suburbs in her electorate to be excluded from the state government’s plan for more housing near transport hubs, in an intervention that exposes rifts within Labor about the push for higher density.
Rowland’s concerns relate to plans to rezone areas of Glenwood and Stanhope Gardens, which are next to the Kellyville and Bella Vista metro stations, as part of the NSW government’s signature Transport-Oriented Development Program.
An artist’s impression of higher density at Kellyville and Bella Vista metro stations included with the NSW government’s planning documents.
In a submission to the public exhibition of the plan, seen by The Sun-Herald, Rowland says gaps in school, hospital, road and transport infrastructure “need to be remedied before further density is considered for these suburbs”.
She also said her petition to “stop high-rises in Stanhope Gardens and Glenwood” had amassed more than 1000 signatures.
Both suburbs are currently zoned for low-density. The master plan by the NSW Department of Planning would rezone areas close to the metro stations for eight- or nine-storey apartments. It would increase Glenwood’s capacity from 1872 to 12,603 dwellings, and Stanhope Gardens from 2061 dwellings to 9538.
However, the department predicts slow growth in those suburbs in the next 15 years. It anticipates 1791 new dwellings would be delivered in Glenwood by 2041, and just 364 in Stanhope Gardens.
The proposal concentrates new capacity on the western side, in Stanhope Gardens and Glenwood, but predicts most growth for the next 15 years will happen on the eastern side, in Kellyville and Bella Vista.
Rather, it expects most of the growth for the next 15 years to be on the eastern side, in the suburbs of Kellyville and Bella Vista themselves, which are projected to deliver 10,500 new homes between them.
As federal communications minister, Rowland is one of the most senior Labor figures in western Sydney. She has held the seat of Greenway since 2010, turning it into a safe Labor seat.
She warned rapid growth in Sydney’s north-west had already left key arterial and feeder roads at capacity, which worsened traffic on Old Windsor Road, on which the metro stations sit.
“The streets around Glenwood and the entry and egress for the suburb mean that residents are wedged in traffic jams even as they leave their own driveways,” she wrote in her submission, which she copied directly to Scully.
“Mass transit options are also at capacity with locals complaining that parking, and bus services around the precinct’s metro stations, are struggling to properly service residents.”
Rowland credited the Labor state government and Commonwealth with starting infrastructure projects such as the future Rouse Hill hospital, but said these were in their early stages.
Communications Minister Michelle Rowland holds the federal seat of Greenway by a healthy margin.Credit: The Sydney Morning Herald
She said while she supported the concept of increased density near existing infrastructure, “in this case, the necessary infrastructure does not yet exist in Glenwood and Stanhope Gardens to support the scale of the accelerated rezoning that is proposed”.
Asked about Rowland’s position at a budget estimates hearing on Friday, Planning Minister Paul Scully said his Labor colleague supported more housing and she was simply concerned about the infrastructure backlog left by the Coalition government.
Scully rejected assertions by opposition planning spokesman Scott Farlow that Rowland was a “NIMBY”, or “not in my backyard”, and instead branded the Liberals the “anti-housing party” for trying to disallow the entire Transport-Oriented Development Program in the parliament.
“Your housing target is zero,” Scully said. But he said the government would take on board all submissions, Rowland’s included.
Rowland is not alone in Labor for criticising the proposed rezoning. Warren Kirby, the state Labor MP for Riverstone, says he has met Scully, Premier Chris Minns and Deputy Premier Prue Car to relay the community’s concerns about the plans. Minns “has made it clear that our community must stop taking all the growth”, Kirby says.
The Liberal-led Hills Shire Council also raised concerns about the proposal in its submission. It warned if Stanhope Gardens is ultimately removed, as Rowland wants, “then the projected yield within this part of the precinct should not be transferred onto land east of Old Windsor Road”.
The Planning Department said the low projections for new homes in Stanhope Gardens - 364 by 2041 - reflected ownership arrangements involving community title schemes, as well as traffic, parking and narrow roads.
“Resolving some of these factors could lead to more apartment buildings and improved amenity for residents,” it said. “Not all precincts with uplifted planning controls will be delivered immediately, and the government’s new housing reforms are intended to increase housing supply not only over the period of the National Housing Accord but also over the medium- to long-term.”
The exhibition of plans for Kellyville and Bella Vista, along with five other “accelerated precincts” under the TOD program, has now ended, and the Planning Department will respond to feedback.
Plans for the eighth accelerated precinct, Bays West, have been delayed until next year while the government awaits a review into whether the Glebe Island industrial ports should be relocated to make way for high-density housing at The Bays.