Northern Beaches Nursery to Give Way to Townhouses

Long-time Sydney property developer Barrie Nesbitt has filed plans to sub-divide a 2ha block in Sydney’s northern beach suburbs, before building 53 townhouses on the resulting lots.

The 2.06ha at 20-22 Macpherson Street, Warriewood, is the current home of Flower Power Garden Centre, which has operated as an indoor and outdoor nursery there since 1984.

Under the plans before the Northern Beaches Council Nesbitt’s Green Kingswood Pty Ltd would demolish the nursery and sub-divide the property into a 54-lot integrated housing community, 20km north of Manly.

The development—with estimated costs of $35.9 million—would include essential services like stormwater, potable and waste water, electricity, gas and internet as well as a new road network.

PBD Architects have designed 13 different townhouse lay-outs for ten free-standing and 43 attached, two-storey homes. They range from three-bedroom with a single garage to four-bedrooms and double garages.

Town planners Urbis, which filed the documents, said 34 “low and very low retention value trees” would be removed. The species are exempt from Northern Beaches Council’s Tree Preservation Order. However, the development would also mean the removal of four “high-category trees.”

▲ Architects have designed 13 lay-outs for proposed 53 townhouses.

In pre-lodgement meetings in February, 2022 and again in March this year, the council’s Design and Sustainability Advisory Panel said it considered “the amount of development excessive” and that “the permissible height has not been exploited fully.”

However, the developers argued the number of homes was permitted under clauses in the Pittwater Local Environmental Plan.

“This comment by the panel is in direct contrast to council’s PLM (pre-lodgement meeting) which states that alternative dwelling formats such as residential flat buildings or multiple occupancy homes are explored,” Urbis wrote.

“The proposed development is the least likely selection of dwelling typology to represent an overdevelopment of the site due to the existing and emerging surrounding character.”

Green Kingswood, of which Barrie Nesbitt is the sole director, acquired the Macpherson Street property in July of 2021, paying $30.7 million.

Last month, the Sydney North Planning Panel decided four votes to one to amend North Sydney’s 2013 local environmental plan to allow for another Nesbitt development at 360 Pacific Highway, in Crows Nest.

In overruling North Sydney Council, the planning allowed the mixed-use tower to rise 18 storeys in an area currently gazetted for heights of up to 10 metres.