139 Boundary Road, North Melbourne

139 Boundary Road, North Melbourne

Rezone: 139 Boundary Rd North Melbourne – 330 Apts 23,589 SQM of NSA, Amendment c190 – Purchased as IN1Z, Rezoned & Divested.

Site Background

Located in North Melbourne, some three kilometres north-west of the Melbourne CBD, 139-145 Boundary Road was an irregular shaped, Industrial 1 Zoned site with an area of approximately 4,259 square metres. The site has two street frontages, a primary frontage to Boundary Road and a secondary frontage to Alfred Street and is approximately 65 metres south of the intersection with Racecourse Road, and abutting a Road Zone 1 (RDZ1 – Boundary Road).

Improved on the site is a two storey commercial building facing Boundary Road, together with a single storey warehouse located behind it which extends to the rear of the site and can be accessed via Alfred Street.  The site was purchased in April 2017 being leased at the time of the acquisition.

Planning

The property is located in an area referred to as the Macauley Urban Renewal Precinct with industrial segments in North Melbourne and Kensington.

In 2012, the Arden-Macaulay Structure Plan was released by City of Melbourne, identifying areas that will transition into sustainable living and working environments over the next 30 years. In 2016, Arden and Macaulay were separated into two projects, due to changes in the planning context.

The Macauley Urban Renewal Precinct was identified in a 2017 State Government Metropolitan Strategy “Plan Melbourne”. As Melbourne grows from 4.6 million people to 8 million by 2051, the plan sought to direct a significant proportion of population growth to a number of major urban renewal areas surrounding the central city area in order to ‘minimize the need to increase densities in other parts of the city’.

Plan Melbourne clearly articulated a vision for these areas to become mixed use neighborhoods and major sources of higher density housing, however the timing and staging of planning and development across these precincts varied.

Late in 2018, the Minister for Planning approved Amendment C190 which was incorporated as part of the Melbourne Planning Scheme. Following the planning scheme amendment, the asset was rezoned to Mixed Use with a preferred building height of 9 storeys and an absolute max of 12 storeys.

Yield

Following a planning review from Urbis and as per the schematic drawings, commissioned by Fender Katsalidis architects, the determined yield was for a residential development providing 316 apartments and 22,068 square meters of Net Saleable Area. Car parking is provided throughout two levels of basement and the lower ground level, with vehicle access occurring via a double width crossover at the Boundary Road frontage of the site.

Status

The property was sold in September 2018 for an undisclosed amount.