APH’s Multi-Billion-Dollar City Park Gets Go-Ahead

A multi-billion-dollar masterplanned project is poised to get under way in Melbourne’s east after winning planning approval.

The Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal granted James Zhang’s  APH Holding planning permission for its City Park project at the corner of Burwood Highway and Springvale Road, Forest Hill, in the City of Whitehorse.

City Park will be a major precinct including commercial, retail, hospitality, events, entertainment, technology and lifestyle uses and amenities on a 8.2ha site at 347-353 Burwood Highway, 18km east of the Melbourne CBD.

The masterplan includes more than 50,000sq m of retail, sports, entertainment, dining, childcare, gym, healthcare and wellness spaces and facilities.

It will include two hotels with more than 400 rooms as well as a Woolworths supermarket.

A convention centre, walking and running tracks, green spaces and appropriate car parks are also included.

APH said it would focus on experience retail in the precinct to draw peoiple to it for services, shopping or dining.  

More than 10,000 jobs are expected to be generated by the precinct.

▲ City Park is poised to get under way in Melbourne’s east.

The precinct will comprise commercial space of 35,000sq m, which has drawn interest from major technology and corporate firms, including Hewlett Packard, NEC, Pronto Software, Eastern Health, PAN Software, Bolton Clarke and Hamilton Morello.

The site is close to major tram and bus routes as well as the Glen Waverley Railway Station. 

“This development shows a vision for the future and will become an important business hub for the fast-growing eastern corridor of Melbourne city,” APH Holding chief executive Johnson Zhang said. 

The City of Whitehorse has been the focus of significant development interest as development activity in Box Hill and other suburbs increases.

Developers are now looking at opportunities within CBD fringe suburbs and those bordering them to try to increase density around housing, work and services close to existing hubs and transport networks.