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It’s been branded “beyond repair”, an “eyesore” and the “boulevard of broken dreams” but a rezoning deal will now allow “Sydney’s ugliest road” to carry 8000 new homes.
The NSW Government has signed a deal with Inner West Council to rezone a section of Parramatta Road within the Inner West local government area, from Camperdown through to Croydon Park.
Industry groups have welcomed the move but warned delivery would depend on rezonings converting into development applications and completions.
The deal, billed as the most serious attempt yet to revive the tired corridor, promises higher densities along one of Sydney’s busiest transport spines.
Planning works will examine affordable housing, open space, retail and public domain upgrades.
The Inner West rezoning adds to work already under way with Burwood and Canada Bay councils and feeds into a pipeline of more than 40,000 homes across the wider corridor.
Parramatta Road has been the subject of renewal strategies before.
The 2016 Corridor Urban Transformation Strategy promised 27,000 new homes across eight precincts but progress has been slow.
A Stage 1 planning proposal finalised in late 2022 covered the Kings Bay, Burwood-Concord and Homebush North precincts, while others including Leichhardt, Taverners Hill and Croydon remain in early planning.
Critics cite traffic, infrastructure funding and complex land ownership as the main roadblocks.
“Parramatta Road has been talked about for decades with little result,” Premier Chris Minns said. “It’s time to stop talking and start building.”
Minns said the aim was to revitalise the corridor with more homes, stronger communities and access to jobs and transport.
Planning minister Paul Scully said working with Inner West Council would ensure planning reflected local needs while delivering new homes.
“Parramatta Road needs more homes and jobs in vibrant communities,” he said.
“It’s a major transport corridor that connects so many communities to the city but it can be so much more than a tired thoroughfare.”
Inner West Mayor Darcy Byrne said locals supported more homes along Parramatta Road as the right location for higher density.
“Our Inner West community wants to see more desperately needed new homes delivered and local people are telling us that the Parramatta Road corridor is the right location for higher residential densities,” Byrne said.
Acting Urban Taskforce chief executive Stephen Fenn welcomed the move, saying it “offers some hope finally that we will start seeing the rezonings required to transform one of Sydney’s greatest eyesores”.
But he warned the 8000-home target should be seen only as a baseline.
“The government believes that the rezoning could facilitate 8000 new homes. That should be the start,” he said.
“Despite its strategic location, plan after plan and a lack of co-ordination between state and local government has left us with a boulevard of broken dreams.”
“It has been more than a decade since the previous government announced the ‘New Parramatta Road’ concept.”
He called for a corridor-wide approach from Central to Auburn, including the old WestConnex sites at Ashfield and Haberfield.
Delivery, he said, would depend on rezonings converting into DAs and completions, with “a lighter touch in terms of fees, taxes and charges” to make projects feasible.
Fenn also pointed to other opportunities including resurrecting the Woollahra Station plan and Long Bay, arguing Sydney’s housing shortage could not be solved through a single project.
“Sydney’s housing supply crisis could not be solved through a Plan B, but needed Plans B, C and D right through to Plans X, Y and Z,” he said.
“The only way we are going to solve the supply crisis is a bipartisan approach to opportunities like Parramatta Road, Woollahra and Long Bay.”
