Uniting plans 18-storey retirement living tower in Sydney’s southwest
Uniting’s Yagoona tower project backed for SSD pathway
- Big plans: 218 retirement units plus 90 aged care beds proposed
- Density jump: 18-storey tower planned beside Yagoona station
- Fast-track push: Housing Delivery Authority backs SSD status
- Lifestyle mix: Café, pool, gym and wellness spaces included
The Not For Profit, which has a number of approved seniors housing developments, is set to lodge another State Significant Development Application.
The NSW Housing Delivery Authority has recommended the action after Uniting sought to redevelop an ageing retirement village and low-density houses in Yagoona, 20km southwest of Sydney’s CBD, and 140 metres from the suburb’s railway station.
Uniting is seeking to build an 18-storey tower on the consolidated seven-lot site of 8,400 sqm for:
- 218 independent living units, including 5% affordable housing;
- a 90-bed aged care facility; and
- an activated ground floor.
Under the Canterbury-Bankstown LEP, the site is currently capped at 25 metres in height with a 2:1 FSR. The rezoning would lift those controls to 65 metres and 3.75:1 – a near-tripling of the permissible height.
The indicative concept by Jackson Teece shows three towers – eight, 14 and 18 storeys – sitting above a four-storey podium. The ground-floor activation includes a café, gym, chapel, salon, cinema and communal spaces including a swimming pool and courtyard.
The rezoning also requires an amendment to Schedule 1 of the LEP to allow commercial premises and indoor recreation facilities – the café and gym – as additional permitted uses, as neither is permissible on the R4-zoned land.
The Housing Delivery Authority has:
- Recommended to the Minister that this project be declared SSD;
- Formed the view that the development proposal is of State Significance as it satisfies the HDA SSD criteria;
- Recommended that the applicant be advised that any proposed rezoning and SSD will need to involve a discussion with Council on potential road network upgrades required due to significant uplift.
Uniting already has State Significant Development approvals in place to:
- Redevelop its Belrose aged care home in Sydney’s Northern Beaches into a $200M intergenerational health precinct;
- Redevelop Uniting Kingscliff in the NSW Northern Rivers;
- Build the $500 million Waverley Estate, its biggest project in Sydney; plus
- The first SSDA for seniors housing approved for Uniting Charlestown, 10km southwest of Newcastle’s CBD.
