Industry Cautiously Welcomes NSW Planning Sidestep

Plans to introduce a new planning pathway in New South Wales that circumvents local government have been met with cautious optimism by the industry. 

The NSW Government revealed the state-led pathway late last week. It will allow major residential housing projects to bypass the council determination processes. 

A new body, the Housing Delivery Authority (HDA), will oversee that pathway, which is aimed at reducing approval times and speeding up the delivery of new homes. 

The option will be available to developments with an estimated development cost of $60 million or more in Greater Sydney—which the state said was on average about 100 homes—and $30 million or approximately 40 or more homes in regional NSW. 

The HDA will be overseen by the Premier’s department secretary Simon Draper, planning department secretary Kiersten Fishburn and Infrastructure NSW chief executive Tom Gellibrand.

The reforms are due to come into effect early next year, the state said.

Willowtree Planning managing director Chris Wilson said that the “devil will be in the detail”.

“The intent is very sound, they’re great initiatives, but I want to know more about how they plan on implementing it and what the regulations are around it.

“It paves the way for more development approvals to come to pass in expeditious manner, but they need to ensure they don’t get bogged down in bureaucracy. 

“The National Housing Accord targets that has been dished up are unbelievably ambitious ... they may become more likely if they roll out these initiatives and roll them out well.”

▲ The National Housing Accord’s targets mandate NSW to deliver 377,000  homes by 2029.

Urbis director of planning Stephen White said the reforms were a positive step towards addressing the housing crisis. 

“The questions are around whether it’s likely to be oversubscribed,” White told The Urban Developer.

“If history tells us anything it’s that the interest from industry will far exceed the capability of the government to process them all through the initiative. I’m hopeful that they’ve got the resources to ensure that a significant quantum of housing projects can be processed. 

“It also means that the premier has a greater ability to control outcomes, so it’s a move to address issues in the system itself.”

Property Council of Australia NSW executive director Katie Stevenson said the changes were “a vital move” to remove unnecessary delays in the approvals process, provide greater certainty to the industry and address housing availability across the state.

“Time is money. Improving planning approval timeframes will make a significant difference to development feasibility with potential to deliver major savings to the cost of a new home in NSW,” she said in a statement. 

“[But] there is still work to be done to address broader industry challenges such as the costs of construction, labour shortages and the impacts of taxes on feasibility to the government’s housing agenda.”