48-storey Penrith tower proposed with 68 affordable homes

A State Significant Development application for a 48-storey tower at 614-632 High Street, Penrith, remains in Response to Submissions, with an objection lodged against it as recently as 8 October, according to the SSD-99780457 file on the NSW Planning Portal. Submissions on the file say the Land and Environment Court upheld the refusal of an earlier scheme for the same site in 2023, in a case brought by Urban Apartments Pty Ltd, an Urban Property Group entity per apartments.com.au.

Why it matters

The portal record does not carry a determination. Response to Submissions is the assessment stage that follows public exhibition, where the applicant addresses objections before a determination. The file names no consent authority and no decision date. For Penrith builders and agents, it signals a 453-home supply play still well short of a construction start.

That history matters for how the application should be read. Submissions attached to the SSD file reference an earlier application for the same High Street site, DA20/0167, refused by the Sydney Western City Planning Panel in 2021, with the refusal upheld in the Land and Environment Court in 2023 (Urban Apartments Pty Ltd v Penrith City Council [2023] NSWLEC 1094). The current 48-storey proposal is a fresh State Significant Development pathway for the same land, not a revival of that refused application.

Urban Property Group is not new to the Penrith skyline. Mayfair, the final stage of the Sheffield Quarter precinct near Penrith railway station, is under construction, and the group has been developing in the suburb for more than a decade, according to apartments.com.au’s report on the new tower. The group is also pursuing a separate six-tower, 1,222-apartment plan for Concord West, reported on 17 October, so the High Street application is one of several large schemes it has before the state system at once.

The affordable housing commitment is the other structural feature of the application. Sixty-eight apartments are nominated as affordable housing, to be run by a registered community housing provider, which the SSD pathway for in-fill affordable housing is designed to deliver in exchange for the uplift the 48-storey height represents.

The numbers

The tower would hold 453 total residences: 341 conventional apartments and 112 serviced apartments, on top of a six-storey non-residential podium carrying three retail spaces, according to the project description on the SSD file.

Of the 341 conventional apartments, 68 are nominated as affordable housing. That is about 20 per cent of the standard apartments, or about 15 per cent of the 453 total residences once serviced apartments are counted in, on our reading of the file’s own apartment figures.

The SSD file does not state a capital investment value, a car parking count or a non-residential floor area for the retail podium, and none is reported here.

What’s next

The application sits with the applicant to finalise responses to submissions before the application can proceed to a determination. No hearing date or decision timeframe appears on the public file.

The 2023 court outcome on the site’s earlier DA does not bind the current State Significant Development application, which is assessed under a separate pathway. Objectors are already citing it in submissions against the new proposal.

No cost, funding or construction start has been disclosed for the High Street tower, and none is estimated here. The next public marker will be the panel’s determination, or a further round of submissions if the application is amended first.