Waterloo South Post Exhibition Report & Proposal Amendments Guide

On 5 August 2022, the Department of Planning and Environment (DPE) advised submitters that the department had reviewed all feedback received during the exhibition period. DPE had undertaken some further studies and had made changes to the exhibited plan. Here REDWatch provides a guide to the documents, the changes and the new studies

What DPE said in its email

After careful consideration of the feedback received during public exhibition and findings from the additional studies, the department made improvements to the plan that:

remove the proposed opening of Pitt Street to McEvoy Street
make the purpose of the design guide clearer
make information more consistent across the planning documents and better aligned with local planning rules
provide greater flexibility and opportunity for innovation in building designs
update the plan to meet with current state planning policy

The revised plan for Waterloo South has now been submitted for review against the gateway conditions and finalisation. A final decision on the plan will be made by the Minister for Planning and Homes (or their delegate) in late 2022.

DPE have put more information on its at Waterloo South webpage. The amended documents have also been posted on the NSW Planning Portal.

Finding the New Documents

As many found during the exhibition, the document handling aspects of the NSW planning portal are poor, REDWatch below has provided direct links to new material before providing a more detailed breakdown on our observations of the planning proposal changes.

Post exhibition report / proposal as submitted for final assessment

Cover letter and Attachment A - schedule of post-exhibition amendments
Attachment B - Revised planning proposal - Waterloo Estate (South)
Attachment C - Draft design guide - Waterloo Estate (South)
Attachment D - technical studies referenced in section 9 of the planning proposal
Attachment E - Draft maps - Waterloo Estate (South)
Alteration of Gateway determination (7 July 2022) - Waterloo Estate (South)

New Studies prepared post-exhibition

Submissions report –Waterloo 29 pages.
CPTED (Mecone) - Waterloo Estate 48 pages.
Addendum updated transport assessment (Bitzios) - Waterloo Estate 15 pages.
Revised addendum to urban design (Hassell) - Waterloo Estate (South) 211 pages (original report with amendments.
Overshadowing analysis (Hassell) - Waterloo Estate (South) 15 pages.

What are the main Changes?

Attachment A to the amended proposal sets out the main changes in the proposal, although the implications of some sections of the summary are not immediately evident. The summary below by REDWatch is based primarily on Attachment A to try and highlight the areas likely to be of most interest to the community.

Pitt Street extended but not being opened up to McEvoy Street

In direct response to public submissions where concerns were raised around the proposed opening of the Pitt Street extension to McEvoy Street, Bitzios Consulting was re-engaged to prepare an addendum updated transport assessment. This assessment investigated the impacts that would likely result on the traffic network within the precinct if the proposed Pitt Street extension did not allow vehicular movements on to or from McEvoy Street.

The work found that alternative access and egress routes are available and not opening Pitt Street would be appropriate. This change was supported by Transport for NSW.

It is now proposed that Pitt Street will be extended to the south, but it will not allow vehicular movements on to or from McEvoy Street

Percentage of social and affordable housing retained

While LAHC argued in their submission that percentages for social and affordable housing should not be included, the amended proposal retains them.

Amendments have been made clarify that the minimum percentage of social and affordable housing also applies to increases from design excellence. LAHC wanted the percentages removed in their submission but they have been retained.

Change in Tower Foot prints and overshadowing

The footprints of the three taller buildings along McEvoy Street have been enlarged and moved.

This has been done to allow additional flexibility in the design and placement of these buildings, noting they will be subject to design competitions requiring five entries.
For the taller buildings at the corners of George/McEvoy Streets and Pitt/McEvoy Streets, the footprints have been extended to the north. This ensures overshadowing impacts on residential apartments on the south side of McEvoy Street are minimised.
The footprint of the taller building at the corner of Cope/McEvoy Streets has been extended to the north and slightly to the east. To ensure overshadowing impacts on the southern pocket park are minimised, an additional provision has been included in the design guide to ensure that at least 50% of the park area receives a minimum of 4 hours sunlight at the winter solstice between 9am and 3pm.
The amended footprints are as below.

From 733sqm to 913sqm (25% increase) at corner of Cope and McEvoy Streets
From 724sqm to 844sqm (16% increase) at corner of George and McEvoy Streets
From 702sqm to 878sqm (25% increase) at corner of Pitt and McEvoy Streets
No changes to footprint at corner of Kellick and Gibson Streets

According to the Overshadowing analysis the increase in Footprint at Cope and McEvoy decreases solar access on the small park. The exhibited proposal provided 56.% of the park received four hours of sun between 0am and 3pm mid-winter, while the new footprint reduces this to 50.25%.

Some minor amendments to Height of Building (HOB) maps were required and the heritage item at 225-227 Cope Street has been mapped with a 9m maximum.

Floor Space Ratio (FSR) changes primarily for private sites

FSRs for private sites have been mapped as proposed in Council’s original proposal with the exception of 233 Cope Street and 110 Wellington Street where the additional 0.25:1 Basics stretch have now been included.

Amendments have been made to adjust the proportions of total floor area that will be subject to a higher percentage contribution on Private sites and these will be handled through a new schedule to the Sydney LEP.

FSRs for all heritage items have been mapped as proposed in Council’s original proposal.

FSR maps have been amended to exclude land for road widenings (i.e. maps are consistent with future road alignments) but including landscape and other setbacks to ensure consistency between FSR and HOB maps.

The planning proposal as submitted does not include any land reserved for acquisition, and the land reservation acquisition map that was exhibited has been removed.

The Design Guide to now to provide “detailed flexible provisions”

In response to LAHC’s submission where it raised concerns that design guide controls will be elevated to development standards when the design guide is given effect through the proposed site-specific clause, which DPE says was not its intent, the design guide has now been prepared to provide a hierarchy of objectives, design guidance and other provisions to guide future development in the area.

DPE say the change is to allow a degree of flexibility and allow for appropriate merit-based assessment to ensure applications demonstrate satisfaction of objectives. REDWatch has not tried to assess the increased flexibility changes in the design guide or their implications.

Other Design Guide changes

In response to Council’s submission, reference to Council’s Alternative natural ventilation of apartments in noise environments performance pathway has been added
Minor rewording in Design excellence guidelines following consultation with Government Architect NSW to ensure design excellence processes are referenced correctly. The design excellence procedure remains and does not appear to have been changed as requested by LAHC.
Minor rewording in Design excellence guidelines following consultation with Government Architect NSW to ensure design excellence processes are referenced correctly. The design excellence procedure remains and does not appear to have been changed as requested by LAHC
Amendments have been made to align with recent changes in NSW planning instruments,
General wording has been amended to make the document clearer, and minor errors have been corrected.

If you notice anything we have missed or you think is important to add then please contact REDWatch by email on mail@redwatch.org.au

Brief Comments on the Studies

Submissions report

A submissions report has been prepared by Keylan Consulting for DPE to address and analyse all submissions and feedback received during public exhibition. Regrettably the report is very general and breaks all submissions comments down to general key issues and some sub issues which it then mostly dismisses as adequately addressed in the proposal. Key areas raised by Government or Council submissions, that lead to changes in the proposal are not noted or covered in the report.

People who made submissions may want to see if their concerns made it into the issues and sub-issues and how they were responded to.

Like REDWatch, some NGOs, Council and lots of individual submissions, you may have raised the need for a Social Impact Assessment. You will not find it acknowledged in the report nor how it fits within the reports key themes approach.

Presumably this fits in the conclusion catchall in the report that says: Consideration of other issues raised in the submissions are deemed to be adequately addressed or alternatively warrant further consideration as part of any future Development Application for development on the site.

Crime Prevention through Environmental Design (CPTED) report

In direct response to public comments and submissions where concerns around safety and security were raised, DPE engaged Mecone to prepare a CPTED report. This report assesses the built form and layout proposed in the planning proposal, including through-site-links, parks and other public spaces. The report makes recommendations as to what measures need to be considered to make the area, including cross block connections safe and to allow active surveillance.

Addendum updated transport assessment

We have dealt with this earlier but for completeness will repeat the summary here.

In direct response to public submissions where concerns were raised around the proposed opening of the Pitt Street extension to McEvoy Street, DPE re-engaged Bitzios Consulting to prepare an addendum updated transport assessment. This assessment investigated the impacts that would likely result on the traffic network within the precinct if the proposed Pitt Street extension did not allow vehicular movements on to or from McEvoy Street.

The work found that alternative access and egress routes are available and not opening Pitt Street would be appropriate. This change was supported by Transport for NSW. It is now proposed that Pitt Street will be extended to the south, but it will not allow vehicular movements on to or from McEvoy Street.

Urban design review and overshadowing analysis

To facilitate amendments, Hassell were re-engaged to update their urban design review with any changes, including Pitt Street no longer allowing vehicular movements to McEvoy Street and enlarging of tower footprints.

Following feedback during public exhibition, Hassell were also engaged to prepare an overshadowing analysis. This analysis has been prepared to consolidate overshadowing drawings and analyse the shadows cast on Waterloo Park, the southern pocket park, and Our Lady of Mount Carmel.

Waterloo South – North Eveleigh Comparison

For those with an interest in both planning proposals, it is worthwhile noting that the proposals take a very different approach to rezoning. In Waterloo South the floor space ratio is set for each development block in the Sydney Local Environment Plan (LEP). In South Eveleigh a floor space is set in the LEP equally across the site, meaning that areas set down to be roads and public spaces all have an FSR of 2.78:1. The North Eveleigh Planning proposal allocates this space in the lesser design guide administered by DPE, meaning there is much less certainty and changes to where FSR is allocated does not need to amend the LEP planning controls.

In Waterloo South, the land use zoning is more nuanced that in North Eveleigh with the site broken up into three use zones where in North Eveleigh other than a little railway use near Redfern Station the whole area, including public space is zoned B4 mixed use. In Waterloo South there is a RE1 – Public Recreation Zoning and B2 Local Centre Zoning with the predominantly residential areas and the small park zoned as B4 mixed use. In Waterloo Council hailed to Public Recreation Zoning for the park as a major win in ensuring that the space would be guaranteed as public space into the future as opposed to the current situation on Waterloo Green where the space could be used for redevelopment in the future.

It is likely that North Eveleigh will follow the South Eveleigh model where public spaces are controlled by the developer for the first 25 years before eventually going to Council. In the case of South Eveleigh REDWatch was successful in getting positive covenants and easements put in place to ensure public access to public space and facilities, heritage and access through the site.