Townhouse Plans Filed for Brunswick Social Housing

Housing Victoria has filed plans for the townhouse component of the Brunswick West social housing project in Melbourne’s northern suburbs. 

The application for planning permission to the planning department lists 29 townhouses as part of developing the site at 1 Gronn Place, Brunswick West. 

The site is also known as Harvest Square.

The Victorian government has invested $86.05 million into the Brunswick West redevelopment project, which is estimated to create 770 jobs.

The project has a goal of creating 111 social housing homes, 8 community homes and 79 market homes (50 apartments and 29 townhouses) with 5 per cent of the housing mix being fully accessible by the Disability Discrimination Act standards. 

Housing Victoria has partnered with AV Jennings and Women’s Housing Limited to deliver the project.

The site is the former Gronn Place Public Housing Estate and covers 15,112sq m of land across 1-100 Gronn Place. 

It was created in the 1960s with six three and four-storey blocks of walk-up flats and eight semi-detached houses for a total of 82 homes. 

Over the years the homes were not upgraded to allow better accessibility, ventilation and living conditions for the tenants, rendering them unfit to live in.

All the previous tenants were relocated to locations with better living conditions and amenity before demolition began in 2020. 

▲ One of the buildings in the former 1960s Gronn Place Public Housing Estate that has since been demolished to create new social housing.

The project is part of the Victorian government’s $185-million Public Housing Renewal Program and is one of nine sites in metropolitan Melbourne selected to develop or improve social housing. 

The plans designed by SJB Architects include three six–storey apartment buildings (two of which will be publicly owned while the other will be sold to private buyers), a three-storey apartment building to be owned by Women’s Housing Limited and 29 two-three storey townhouses to be sold to private buyers.

Housing Victoria will retain ownership of all the property until the development project is completed.

Each building will have a basement level for car and bicycle parking with vehicle access restricted to the outskirts of the site to allow for pedestrian access through the site. 

The townhouses will have a garage each with visitor carparking restricted to the streets on the outskirts of the site. 

The townhouses will be a mix of two and three-bedroom homes. 

The model allows for a mix of residents to live within the community, creating better outcomes for all residents and lessening the stigmas associated with social housing projects. 

It has been estimated that about 100,000 people will be homeless each year in Melbourne, particularly due to consequences of the pandemic and the rise in the cost of living. 

The recent federal budget also highlighted how much housing was needed.