Sydney's Growth Is Not Being Spread Evenly Across Councils

A review of housing completions across metropolitan Sydney indicates that many councils are not carrying their fair share of growth says the Urban Taskforce.

“The Department of Planning’s Housing Monitor lists housing completions across all of Sydney’s councils each month.” Says Urban Taskforce CEO Chris Johnson “The top ten councils are completing more than 2,000 homes each over the last year but the bottom ten councils are only averaging around 200 homes a year.”

“Leading the development of new homes over the last year are the City of Sydney with 4,351 completions, The City of Parramatta with 4,231, Blacktown with 3,325 and Bayside with 3,073 new homes. At the other end of the housing supply performance are Willoughby with 201 completions, Randwick with 200, Waverley with 119 and Mosman with only 8 new homes.”

“The housing completion numbers are taken from September 2017 to August 2018 from the NSW Government’s Housing Monitor for each council across Metropolitan Sydney.”

“The council areas that should be pulling their weight more are the ones with good rail infrastructure like the North Shore rail line. It is disappointing to see that Willoughby with its excellent rail connections is in the bottom 10 performers with only 201 housing completions. Other North Shore councils with rail stations that seem to be not pulling their weight on housing supply include Ku-ring-gai (899), Hornsby (724), North Sydney (638) and Lane Cove (605).”

“The Eastern Suburbs, admittedly with smaller councils, that are underperforming are Randwick (200), Waverley (119), and Woollahra (73). These suburbs are close to the quality jobs in the CBD and are very desirable places to live.”

“The best performers are two councils which are the focus of the Greater Sydney Commission’s ‘Metropolis of Three Cities’ concept in the form of Sydney and Parramatta, The City of Sydney topped the list with 4,351 new homes completed over the last year followed by the City of Parramatta with 4,231 new homes.”

“The Greater Sydney Commission’s Sydney District Plans identify 5-year housing targets to be achieved by 2021 for each council area. A number of councils are well on track to achieve their targets including Penrith which needs to complete 1,320 new homes a year and exceeded this in the last year with 2,271 completions. The City of Ryde has a target of 1,520 new homes a year but completed 2,275 new homes over the last year and Bayside Council has a target of 2,030 new homes a year over 5 years and exceeded this with 3,073 in the last year.”

“A number of councils are performing below the GSC targets including Randwick which has a low target of 450 a year but only achieved 200 over the last year. Georges River Council has a target of 960 new homes a year but only achieved 495 completions over the last year.”

“The Urban Taskforce believes part of the concerns related to overdevelopment is coming from councils that are carrying the major housing growth on behalf of Greater Sydney. There needs to be a fairer distribution of growth across the whole of Sydney particularly where good public transport infrastructure exists or is being constructed,”