Thirdi Scraps Office Tower for Crows Nest Over-Station Site

Thirdi and Phoenix Property Investors have scrapped plans for an approved office tower above a northern Sydney Metro station, saying the commercial scheme “made no sense”. The $233.4-million State Significant Development application forms the next stage of Hume Place, a mixed-use precinct above Crows Nest Metro Station . The revised scheme reconfigures a 45,000sq m office tower with three residential buildings, delivering 474 apartments—418 build-to-rent and 56 affordable—plus retail, a gym and shared amenities. These form part of the wider Hume Place precinct, which is expected to deliver close to 700 homes above the Metro, including 122 build-to-sell apartments already launched as Stage One under the Elevate banner. “Having 45,000sq m of commercial with no carpark in Crows Nest made no sense from a urban planning kind of view,” Thirdi director Luke Berry told The Urban Developer . The new scheme distributes a smaller amount of commercial and retail space across podium levels, keeping within the same approved building envelope. “We’ve changed it from 45,000sq m of commercial that isn’t really needed on the edge of a village like Crows Nest,” Berry said. “What’s needed is homes and the homes are the key.” Berry said the shift away from commercial use had unlocked the potential for a much broader precinct outcome. The revised plan, he said, better reflected a post-Covid city, where office oversupply had softened demand and made residential-led mixed use a more sustainable fit. He said the strong support for residential use—particularly from government and planning stakeholders—had helped “completely change what’s possible on this site”. “It’s allowed us to design a world-class precinct that responds to what the Crows Nest community actually needs, which is more housing and better access to it,” he said. “That shift in thinking helped unlock a far more meaningful outcome for the precinct and for the broader North Sydney community.” The precinct plan now comprises three buildings—a pair of build-to-rent towers and a third for affordable housing—set above a shared podium. The base includes ground-floor retail, a gym, resident amenities, communal terraces and landscaped public domain upgrades. Commercial space is consolidated in the lower podium to meet planning rules, while the buildings above step down in height across the site, from around 180m to 134.75 metres. Berry said the location—directly above a newly opened metro station—made build-to-rent an obvious fit, with direct access to health and education precincts, and a rental demographic already established in the area. “Hume Place is one of the only projects in Sydney housing directly above a metro station,” he said. “That level of connectivity is incredibly rare, and it makes build-to-rent the perfect model here. “Crows Nest also has a large number of single-person and couple households, who are exactly the type of residents build-to-rent is designed to support, giving them the flexibility of renting with the security of tenure you'd expect from home ownership.” Fifteen per cent of the yield would be affordable housing, to be delivered in partnership with Evolve Housing. “We did a deal with the government that they were given in perpetuity—meaning that forever, those properties are available to health workers in the lower Northshore Healthcare Network,” Berry said. “And that is in partnership with Evolve Housing, a community housing provider that ’ s going to manage that asset and make sure that the right people can live in there and be close to their place of work.” ▲ Woods Bagot rendering of Thirdi’s revised build-to-rent and affordable housing scheme above the Crows Nest Metro Station. Crows Nest Metro Station, which opened in August last year. No new excavation is required as construction would take place above infrastructure already delivered during the Metro build. Designed by Woods Bagot, the buildings are arranged to maximise natural light, ventilation and views, with facades using varied materials and articulated forms to reduce bulk. The towers will be fully electric and include rooftop solar, water-saving systems, and target an average NatHERS rating of 7.1 stars. The site has a long backstory as outlined in planning documents. In the early 1800s, it formed part of Edward Wollstonecraft’s 212ha Crown land grant—land that became Crows Nest Farm and gave the suburb its name. Over time, the area shifted from villas to worker housing to commercial use. A two-storey medical centre stood on the site before it was cleared for tunnelling. The proposal aligns with the Crows Nest Transport Oriented Development rezoning, finalised in 2024, which earmarks the precinct for 5900 new homes and 2500 jobs. “It’s a great outcome for the development of the precinct in the community,” Berry said. “This scheme is far more in tune with what the area actually needs.”

Thirdi Scraps Office Tower for Crows Nest Over-Station Site

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