With the affordable housing crisis reaching dangerous levels, the NSW Government believes the solution lies in creating dwellings in close proximity to the future metro station sites.

The NSW Infrastructure, Cities and Active Transport Minister, Rob Stokes, believes that the ability to grow residential communities around the stations is an opportunity the government must capitalise upon, and indicated as such in a Committee for Sydney summit earlier this week.

“Metro will shift everything. One of the biggest and most exciting projects anywhere in the world will be the Hunter Street station development, which sits at the apex of all those lines,” he says.

Sydney’s population is anticipated to grow from 5.4 million to 6.6 million by 2036. The Department of Planning indicates that the Greater Sydney area will require at least 1 million additional homes by the year 2041, equating to 30,000-40,000 new dwellings each year.

58 percent of respondents to a survey conducted by the Committee for Sydney were in favour of greater urban density around train stations, providing that the government is able to improve the amount of open spaces in suburbs. 17 percent of those surveyed were opposed.

The Committee for Sydney’s Chief Executive, Gabriel Metcalf, says that the metro lines give the government the option to potentially fit half of the growing population that is anticipated by 2036. 

“If we are smart about it, we can focus the growth there and that is where we get the benefits of this massive investment,” he says in an interview with the Sydney Morning Herald.

Transport accounts for more than two thirds of the Perrottet Government’s infrastructure spending for the next four years.

The second stage of Sydney’s metro line, which includes a line from Chatswood, under Sydney Harbour to the CBD and out towards Sydenham and Bankstown, is expected by 2024. The Metro West line, the biggest stage in the entire metro project, will see the metro service reach Parramatta and Westmead from the CBD, is due by 2030. It is estimated the stage will cost over $25 billion.

Stokes indicated on Monday that a number of projects created five years ago may be altered which may affect their delivery and expected time of completion. 

 

Image: Supplied