A key plank of the Minns government’s housing supply push will not arrive in time to meet national housing accord targets.Credit:Steven Siewert
On Monday night,Ku-ring-gai Council unanimously passed a motion condemning the changes. It came less than a week after hosting a public forum in which residents wereshown photographs of apartments in Meadowbank and Burwood and were warned that this was the north shore’s future.
The motion commits Ku-ring-gai Council to campaigning against the changes,joining other Liberal-held councils,including Ryde,in launching public attacks on the government’s density push.
But according to the council’s mayor,Sam Ngai,the government is refusing to hand over key details of the proposal,including modelling used by the Department of Planning to identify the 31 stations subject to rezoning.
The government says that it undertook an analysis of 305 metro and heavy rail stations to identify “locations that have enabling infrastructure capacity” that would allow for greater housing density.
The department used an “evidence-based approach that used planning,infrastructure and spatial data,along with expert analysis and feasibility analysis” to whittle down the list to 31.
But Ngai said the council had been told that the “underlying modelling” used to compile dwelling targets was made in cabinet in confidence and would not be released. The council will now launch its own freedom of information request in a bid to understand “on what basis they did this”.
“My question,or one of my questions,is how come stations like Gordon and Lindfield are part of this but then other areas are left off. What was the rationale?” he said.
Ngai pointed to suburbs such as Summer Hill and Lewisham in the inner west — both in the seat of Transport Minister Jo Haylen — as examples of suburbs that were “10 minutes closer to the city and better connected to heavy rail”.
While Scully did not comment directly on the release of the modelling,he said the information supporting greater density was “in the news every day”.
“Young people,essential workers and families can’t access well-located homes near to their work and family,” he said.
Scully also lashed out at Ku-ring-gai Council over its opposition to more housing,saying it was an issue of “equity not exclusion”.
“Does council want essential workers to have long commutes to work in their local area because it opposes housing growth?” he asked.
“Confronting the housing crisis is a shared responsibility. We seek co-operation with councils not opposition.”
In parliament on Tuesday,Premier Chris Minns lambasted the Liberal opposition on his push for greater housing supply,pointing out that most of the suburbs identified for increased density near transport are in Labor electorates.
Of the 39 so-called Transport Orientated Development zones — a further eight metro and heavy rail stations have been earmarked for a significant state-led development — 26 are in Labor electorates. Only nine were in Liberal-held seats. Three others are in seats held by independents and one is in a Greens electorate.