Update - Wollongong City Centre Planning Review

We are pleased to advise that on 21 September, Council will be considering a report on the refined Wollongong City Centre Urban Design Framework (UDF) for adoption. You can access the report here.

The exhibition of the Draft City Centre Urban Design Framework and Economic Analysis earlier this year revealed that we have broad support for the strategic directions presented, and that community and stakeholders remain aligned with the Vision for the City Centre – A City for People. We have taken on community comments and have made a number of adjustments to the final UDF. As such, a few sections of the report look different.

• In response to feedback that it wasn’t clear how commercial outcomes were being protected in the Commercial Core, more detail around the ways in which commercial development is being prioritised over residential has been added.
• We heard that the area defined as ‘commercial only’ was too big and needed to be adjusted. Following additional testing, the extent of the ‘commercial only’ area has been reduced to sites facing Burelli Street. The Market Street area is no longer ‘commercial only’ and an additional site has been picked up along Burelli Street, so that the Commercial Only area extends to the Station.
• In response to hearing alternate views on how we define Precincts, we have renamed some of the Precincts and adjusted some of the boundaries. A Health Precinct has also been introduced and the Foreshore Precinct has been extended to the Harbour. Minor adjustments have also been made to the MacCabe Park and Eastern Crown Street & Arts Precinct boundaries.
• What we also heard was that the community and industry want to see the next layer of detail – the policy recommendations.

Reporting the UDF to Councillors on 21 September is an important step in moving toward establishing and reporting detailed planning policy recommendations in the future. On resolution to adopt the UDF, we will have Council support to prepare the City Centre Planning Strategy and detailed policy recommendations to bring back to Council and the community for comment.

When will policy changes be available?

On resolution to adopt the UDF, we will have Council support to prepare the City Centre Planning Strategy and detailed policy recommendations to bring back to Council and the community for comment.

The detailed planning policy will include changes to our Local Environmental Plan (LEP) and the City Centre Chapter of our Development Control Plan (DCP). Before we can formally exhibit draft LEP Policy, we need State Government approval. Revisions to the LEP are made through a State Government process called a Planning Proposal. The Planning Proposal, along with the Planning Strategy, draft DCP and other documents, are first reported to Council, to get support to allow the Planning Proposal to be submitted to the State Government Department of Planning, Infrastructure and Environment (DPIE). DPIE can then authorise the public exhibition of the Planning Proposal via what is known as a Gateway process.

All of the reported documents will be available for public viewing from the time they are reported to Council. Council staff will be working to inform the community about the contents of the policy in the lead up to the Gateway and formal Public Exhibition. Once we have Gateway approval, the documents can be put on Public Exhibition, and the community will be invited to respond to the proposed planning policy changes and provide feedback. This feedback will inform the refinement of the policies across both the Council and State Government processes.

Thank you for your input into this process so far. We look forward to continuing to work with you to refine the planning policy direction for the City Centre.

To keep up to date, visit Join the Conversation ( https://our.wollongong.gov.au ) . If you’d like any further clarification on the UDF, or the process moving forward, please contact Kate Rintoul or David Green, City Strategy, 02 4227 7111