Legacy Property, Billbergia Plot MacPark Towers

Property big guns Legacy Property and Billbergia are planning to build two towers in a leafy street opposite the Macquarie Shopping Centre in Sydney’s north.

The entity led by Matthew Hyder [from  Legacy], and John Kinsella and William Kinsella [both from Billbergia] lodged the 255 apartment plans with the City of Ryde council. 

Plans for 15-21 Cottonwood Crescent, Macquarie Park, follow Legacy Property’s approved “beehive” tower across the road, which it sold DA-approved to Romeciti. 

The AJC Architects-designed scheme, with a $182-million development cost, had 21 and 19-storey towers above a shared mixed-use podium three to four-storeys high with “grand” lobbies for residents.

The taller Cottonwood tower had 124 apartments and the Waterloo tower 131 apartments with 263sq m of retail along with 2442sq m of landscaping and 288 parking spaces.

This would replace four four-storey blocks of flats on the 5130sq m site; a common-thread for intensification surrounding Macquarie Shopping Centre.

▲ Place Design Group are behind the landscaping in the proposal for the two towers, which sit between the Elouera Reserve and Shrimptons Creek.

In 2017 the flats were sold to a private developer for $80 million, marking the strongest sales rate per square metre of gross floor area at the time.

The planning report by Urbis shows the site backs on to the Elouera Reserve park and most of the apartments would be two or three bedrooms.

“The proposal will develop a site that is not utilised to its full capacity under the Ryde Local Environmental Plan 2014,” the report said.

“It will maximise land-use opportunities that are associated with the immediate proximity of the Macquarie University Metro Station, as envisaged by the Macquarie Park Place Strategy.”

▲ The AJC Architects-designed scheme proposes simple tower forms with slender profiles to the public open spaces being stepped to create visual interest to the skyline in the heart of the Macquarie Park Corridor.

Last week Billbergia lodged plans for a 48-storey tower at Rhodes to up its housing pipeline including 61 affordable apartments.

Billbergia was also undertaking one of the state’s largest social and affordable housing developments at Arncliffe Central.

In Arncliffe, 75 per cent of the 804 apartments across four buildings were earmarked for social and affordable accommodation. 

Legacy Property was also pumping up its pipeline with a 143-home estate in Orchard Hills, western Sydney among its most recent applications in February.