Lend Lease to develop $1.6 billion precinct in Melbourne’s Docklands

Victoria's Minister for Planning, Matthew Guy has announced that Lend Lease will develop Docklands’ last piece of non-contracted land to create a 2.5 hectare, $1.6 billion precinct that will link central Melbourne to Docklands.

Mr Guy said the site has 'enormous strategic importance'.

“This site will be the first developed link between the CBD and Docklands and once completed will allow the removal of the bridge over Wurrundjeri Way to give pedestrians a sense of the natural continuation of Collins Street,” said Mr Guy.

The site is located diagonally across from Southern Cross Station, with a Flinders Street frontage, Collins Street address and also includes air rights above the Wurundjeri Way road reserve.

Mr Guy said the proposed development has the potential to bring economic benefits to Melbourne through providing approximately 10,000 construction jobs.

“Docklands is becoming a waterfront destination that will be home to 20,000 residents and 60,000 workers upon completion in approximately 2025,” he said.

“As the last major development site in Docklands to be contracted to the market, the site will, over the next decade, bring a diverse range of public spaces, new residential and office accommodation, retail amenity and potentially a hotel.”

The proposed development includes:

• Commercial space totalling more than 100,000 square metres that equates to a net lettable floor area across four buildings for approximately 10,000 workers

• approximately 600 residences

• 1,000 square metres of community spaces

• A covered public square, flanked by a community building and commercial towers

• A public realm design that reinterprets the history of Batman’s Hill

• A north-south laneway resembling the scale of those in the CBD, which will connect Southern Cross Station and Collins Street to Flinders Street, the Northbank precinct and Yarra River.

Subject to planning approval and market demand, construction is set to begin in 2014 with the project to be finished in several stages over a space of 10 years.

Master developer of Docklands and Places Victoria CEO, Peter Seamer said the organisation has attracted more than $8.8 billion of private sector investment and secured up to 3,000 jobs in the construction industry annually since the urban renewal project began in 2000.

“There is currently $1.02 billion worth of construction activity underway across seven projects that will deliver 741 apartments and office space for more than 3,630 workers, helping to grow Docklands’ current population from more than 8,000 residents and 38,000 workers,” Mr Seamer said.

So far, Mr Guy has overseen the approval of eleven commercial developments at Docklands.

“Docklands continues to make a valuable contribution to the Victorian economy and this last link compliments the $300 million community infrastructure plan announced in 2012,” said Mr Guy.

All 140 hectares of Dockland’s is now contracted for development, with 50 per cent of that land being development into the newest part of Melbourne’s CBD.