Marrickville Council embarked on a comprehensive, Council wide strategic planning exercise after new legislation required Councils to prepare comprehensive Local Environmental Plans. SGS led a consultant consortium that worked with Council to prepare the Marrickville Urban Strategy, which had to respond to housing and employment targets at a local and sub-regional level set in the Metropolitan Strategy for Sydney. The Marrickville Urban strategy also had to recognise the many existing plans and strategies within the LGA, and review and address current local land use and zoning issues.
The consultant team identified local opportunities and constraints, carried out comprehensive research and used an innovative urban strategy model to inform decisions about housing and employment demand, supply and recommended targets. There was substantial community and stakeholder consultation: early on, to inform the development of the draft strategy and identify issues, challenges and opportunities. A second consultation stage focused on presenting a draft Urban Strategy and six Discussion Papers to gain community and stakeholder feedback on the directions proposed.
The resulting Marrickville Urban Strategy established detailed visions and strategic directions to planning issues within the Marrickville area over the next 25 years. It did so across the theme areas of housing and living, employment and economy, transport and access, environment and recreation, community and diversity and a healthier community. Council adopted the Urban Strategy and was then in a position to move forward with producing a new Local Environmental Plan LEP, founded on the Strategy, its detailed research and analysis, as well an extensive community input. The project won a Commendation for Urban Planning Excellence from the Planning Institute of Australia (NSW). (Project undertaken in conjunction with Architectus Sydney Pty Ltd and Community Solutions).