“I’m worried we’re again failing to align population growth and public transport investment,” he told the Committee for Sydney’s Sydney Summit on Monday. “When we get the opportunity to deliver more affordable and key worker housing near metro stations,we should be taking it.
“We can’t pretend we don’t need more nurses,paramedics,police officers,teachers,cleaners or hospitality workers closer to Sydney CBD. We do,and the metro provides an opportunity to do that.”
Scully pointed to the Cherrybrook metro station in the Hornsby local government area,and the forthcoming Victoria Cross and Crows Nest stations in the North Sydney LGA,as places ripe for additional development.
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He compared their relatively modest population growth forecasts to that of Blacktown,which added 50,000 people between 2016 and 2021 and,pre-COVID,was expecting its population to grow by another 215,000 by 2041.
A string of metro stations is being built between the city and Bankstown,including Sydenham,Marrickville and Dulwich Hill,and later between the CBD and Westmead,including Pyrmont,the Bays and Five Dock.
Scully saidthe Coalition government “dramatically reduced” the scale of buildings planned for directly above the Crows Nest metro station following complaints from nearby residents. As well as reducing building heights,it halved the number of new homes planned for the site.