Homes NSW plans 15 social homes for vacant Woolloomooloo site
The Nicholson Street block has sat empty since a failed 1989 redevelopment. Homes NSW is consulting locals ahead of lodging a development application with the City of Sydney in December.
Homes NSW is running a community survey on a long-vacant government site on Nicholson Street, Woolloomooloo, open until 30 October, as it prepares a proposal for 15 social homes in Sydney’s inner east. The block has sat empty since a failed redevelopment attempt in 1989, according to the National Tribune and Build Australia, which reported the plans on 9 and 13 October respectively.
Why it matters
A government-owned block sitting idle for close to four decades, a few minutes from the Sydney CBD, is the kind of asset planning policy keeps pointing at as the quiet fix for supply. Homes NSW, the state housing agency under the Minns government, is now moving to activate it rather than leave it on the books. For operators watching the social and affordable pipeline in the City of Sydney local government area, it is a small but concrete data point: an infill site in a tightly held inner suburb is heading toward a lodged DA, not just a press release.
Housing Minister Rose Jackson framed the project as part of putting surplus public land to work during the housing shortage, saying the site “has sat vacant for too long,” per Build Australia and the National Tribune. Independent member for Sydney Alex Greenwich, who has pushed for the site’s revitalisation for years, welcomed the plans; he had already been raising the site’s vacancy when it had passed the two-decade mark, according to the National Tribune.
The numbers
The current concept is small in scale but specific in mix. Homes NSW’s initial design, as reported by both outlets, calls for 15 social homes split 13 one-bedroom and two two-bedroom apartments. Neither outlet’s report carries a construction cost, a builder, or a completion date, and no figure beyond the unit count and mix appears in either account, so no dollar value or delivery date is reported here.
The site itself is not fully described in either article: neither gives a land area or a precise street number range, though the National Tribune’s linked community survey refers to 55-66 Nicholson Street. Both outlets agree the site has been vacant since a redevelopment attempt collapsed in 1989, without detailing what that earlier scheme was or why it fell through.
What’s next
Homes NSW says it has begun engaging with the Woolloomooloo community ahead of a formal Development Application to the City of Sydney, targeted for December. The online survey closing 30 October will feed into a Social Impact Report being prepared as part of that application, and the agency is also running a local photo competition, with selected entries proposed for use as artwork in the finished development, per Build Australia.
Until the DA is lodged, the 15-home figure and the one and two-bedroom mix are Homes NSW’s initial design only, not an approved scheme. For developers and builders tracking the inner-Sydney social housing pipeline, the file to watch is the December DA lodgement with the City of Sydney, which will be the first point the project moves from a consultation exercise to a planning record with a scale and a design that can be checked against the outcome.
It is one of several social and affordable housing proposals moving through Sydney’s planning system at the same time: across the harbour in Lavender Bay, St Vincent de Paul’s housing arm has a lodged SSD for a 20-storey, 165-home tower that had drawn 141 submissions as of last week’s filing (Vinnies proposes 165 homes in 20-storey Lavender Bay tower), a reminder that the Woolloomooloo project is a small entry in a much larger pipeline rather than an isolated announcement.