Toowoomba’s Hutchinson Builders creating 650 modular dwellings for Lismore flood victims in $85m project

The community of Lismore has been devastated by flooding over the past three months, leaving thousands displaced. Now Toowoomba is building them homes — and it will only take weeks for them to be sent to NSW.

Hutchinson Builders construction manager Gavin Taylor (left) and projects manager Rian Cherry as the Toowoomba business unit construct modular housing to support flood victims in Lismore. Picture: Kevin Farmer

Toowoomba hands are building hundreds of homes for victims of the devastating Lismore floods earlier this year — and they will be delivered in less than 20 weeks.

Hutchinson Builders and its team of hundreds of subcontractors in the Garden City have started work on more than 650 modular properties, in an $80m project by the NSW Government that will essentially create new temporary residential communities at Lismore.

The modules, infinitely configurable and based on two basic floor plans, will create just shy of 300 new homes for families currently displaced after the devastating February and March flood events in northern New South Wales.

Hutchinson Builders team leader Sean Lees said as many as 200 tradies would complete eight modules per day from next week.

Tom Cauley (front) with a panel as Hutchinson Builders in Toowoomba construct modular housing to support flood victims in Lismore. Picture: Kevin Farmer

“There are approximately 14,000 in that general area who are either homeless, displaced or affected — you’ve got people living in cars or in tents,” he said.

“The government and stakeholders came to us with the view that we could deliver some modular product for them, semi-temporary emergency accommodation for these people.

“We did a little bit of design work and put some concepts to them of what that would look like and some time frames.

“Housing is at the forefront of those people’s needs so we had an opportunity to collaborate with the key stakeholders.

“They’ve got all the modern conveniences you’d expect (from a unit) – airconditioning, ensuites, built-in joineries, built-in kitchens, they’re climate-controlled and energy efficient.”

Hutchinson Builders in Toowoomba construct modular housing to support flood victims in Lismore, Tuesday, June 7, 2022. Picture: Kevin Farmer

The 650 modules, which will be fully completed and furnished in Toowoomba, are expected to be delivered within 16 weeks.

While the project will obviously benefit the local construction industry, Mr Lees said he and the company wanted to get involved after witnessing the destruction first-hand.

“Some of the damage was pretty confronting – our initial involvement in the project was to go down there and listen to the key stakeholders and it was quite confronting,” he said.

“It was terrible and the impact on people’s lives and property is phenomenal and devastating.

“It’s something that will be good for the local construction industry, but it’s also an easy project to get behind knowing the fruits of this labour will take people out of their cars and put them into comfortable, safe and appropriate housing again.

“I’ve personally had experiences in the 2011 Toowoomba floods, at the time I remember going and helping my sister who was in some water.

“For a lot of us that saw it and lived through it at the time, it’s not a distant memory.”

It’s estimated as many as 1300 people are still in emergency accommodation in Lismore, while just 20 per cent of businesses have returned to operations.