Save western Sydney’s former ADI Site. Website of the ADI Residents Action Group

 Welcome to the Website of the
 ADI Residents Action Group.

 

Western Sydney Conservation Alliance website here

 

Note - Kristina Keneally, the NSW Planning Minister, on Friday the 27th February gazetted an amendment to SREP 30 the zoning plan for the entire ADI Site. She ignored pleas from the public calling on her to use her planning powers to further amend SREP 30 in order to save hundreds of hectares of Cumberland Plain Woodland from the bulldozer and also to fix up numerous other problems with Delfin Lend Leases appalling development proposal.

Penrith Council will now vote on Monday the 9th March to approve Delfins disastrous Western and Central Precinct Plans.

The 16 year campaign of the ADI Residents Action Group will, in effect, come to an end if Penrith Council rubber stamps Delfins Precinct Plans

The reality though is that the ADI Site is a planning disaster. We must not give up until the end. We need to urgently lobby Kristina Keneally, Penrith Council and Allan Shearan the local Member to do the right thing and this is why.

Try this on:

  • Hundreds of hectares of Cumberland Plain Woodland to be bulldozed
  • CPW now being assessed by NSW and Federal Govt's for listing as Critically Endangered. Planning Minister and Councils are taking head in the sand approach to this scientific reality
  • 20,000 trees identified in Delfins tree survey which may be cleared. Council Planners don't know nor care how many trees to be cleared or how this will impact on salinity or increase greenhouse gas emissions. Planners could not name another development consent in the Penrith LGA that has allowed this many trees to be cleared
  • Entire development is within a bushfire prone area
  • Huge bushfire risks and threats to public health and safety due to access problems to site specifically the Central Precinct
  • Only access into the Central Precinct is via roads through the 900 ha Regional Park - Penrith Council Planners happy with this and claim the fire brigade and police will save the day if there is a bushfire
  • Bushfire Asset Protection Zones of only 25 metres in residential areas
  • Some urban zoned areas surrounded by bushland
  • No access from Central Precinct to Werrington. Residents will have to drive kilometres to take kids to school, shop or use community facilities in Werrington.
  • Most residents will drive cars and not use buses
  • Central Precinct is another Glenmore Park but worse. Only two roads in and out but through Regional Park. Residents then need to navigate their way through other precincts and then compete with those residents to get onto already congested arterial roads
  • Penrith Council Report of July 2008 states apartments 2 - 8 storeys in proposed Village area. This would destroy the aesthetics we currently enjoy and is totally out of character with nearby residential development
  • Building blocks as small as 125 square metres
  • Council Planners are not concerned that Delfin Lend Lease have not met their open space requirements (provision of public parkland) within the Western Precinct. Delfin need to provide 19.46 ha but have only provided 15.63 ha. This means Delfin - if allowed to get away with this rip off - will be able to massively profit from developing an extra 3.83 ha of the site
  • The NSW Dept of Environment and Climate Change (DECC) have colluded with Delfin in this rip off of public parkland within the Western Precinct. Delfins open space plans which accompany the Precinct Plans state that DECC is considering allowing parts of the Regional Park (conservation land owned by the public) to be opened up for more intensive recreation uses. Delfin are now using the Regional Park to offset their shortfall of parkland within the development area. This is simply outrageous. Delfin have no rights over the use of the Regional Park. It is public land. Yet when we met with Senior Penrith Council planners they defended Delfin and argued that is what the Regional Park is for. They are under the belief Delfin gifted the Regional Park to DECC and therefore have a say over its management and use.
  • In the Central Precinct Delfin have been allowed to fill over 60 ha of the South Creek floodplain that is below the 1:100 flood zone in order to allow housing and employment lands. Millions of tons of fill will need to be imported by truck. Council and Government have no concerns about the impact on flood levels in South Creek
  • Housing and roads zonings, allowed by the NSW Planning Minister, fracture the existing biodiversity corridor adjacent to Xavier College Ninth Ave Llandilo. Council Planners have no issues with this even though Councils own draft LEP proposes a biodiversity network be created which adjoins the north west corner of the ADI Site
  • Road zoning allowed by the Planning Minister to through the 900 ha Regional Park dividing it into 5 separate areas. This is poor planning and a poor conservation outcome. Roads through the Regional Park will result in losses to the sites fauna. Road widening is allowed in the Regional Park and this will mean the loss of more trees
  • The ADI Site Regional Park has been identified by DECC as a Western Sydney Priority Area for conservation. DECC is preparing a Recovery Plan for the endangered vegetation of the Cumberland Plain and they aim to achieve recovery through managing and protecting the priority areas for conservation. DECC's position on ADI is hypocritical and it is clear Depts within DECC are not talking to one another. The Parks management division is happy for the Regional Park to be a plaything for Delfins residents whilst the Dept in charge of the successful implementation of the Recovery Plan deems the site a priority area for conservation. Penrith Council, if it keeps viewing the Regional Park as public recreation facility, will contribute to the downfall of the future Recovery Plan. The Recovery Plan depends on Councils making the right planning decisions.
  • The Endangered Pimelea spicata in the Western Precinct is set to be destroyed. Council Planners show little concern with this
  • The wetland area in the south-west of the Western Precinct is habitat for rare birds including the Lathams Snipe. This wetland is zoned Regional Park but the area surround it is zoned urban. Any urban development in this area will wreck this wetland and its biodiversity
  • Council Planners are arguing that their hands are tied in fixing up Delfins development and that doing so is up to the Planning Minister. Yes the Minister can sort out a lot of the problems by amending SREP 30 to change the developer friendly zonings but Council under SREP 30 Section 15 have plenty of scope to seek amendments to the Precinct Plans. Yes they need the permission of the Planning Minister to amend a Precinct Plan but this should be forthcoming. The Planning Minister would not want to risk a public slanging match with a local Council over a controversial housing development that is surrounded by three marginal ALP held seats (Londonderry, Penrith and Mulgoa). Council therefore needs to meet with the Planning Minister ASAP

Download our Western and Central Precinct Plan submissions to Penrith Council here 1.4 meg and the addendum here 825 kb

Other news and contact details for Penrith Councillors here


 

 

The ADI Residents Action Group was formed in 1993 because of concerns that the 1535 hectare ADI Site at St Marys would be developed.

The ADI Site gets its name from the Australian Defence Industries Ltd (ADI) a former Commonwealth Government Business entity that used the property as a munitions factory from 1989 to 1993. The ADI Site and the area now known as the Dunheved Industrial Estate were resumed from private ownership for the war effort in the 1940s and 1950s. The site was known from the 1940s as the St Marys Munitions Filling Factory until the name change to the ADI Site in 1989. The munitions factory employed hundreds of local workers right up until it closed in 1994. The Federal Government sold the ADI Site  to Lend Lease, Australia's largest property developer, in 2004 for a sum of around $105 million.

ADI RAG, since 1993, has believed the only way the best social and environmental outcomes could be achieved was if the ADI Site remained undeveloped and was left for conservation and some passive recreation uses. We have been actively campaigning against Lend Lease and various levels of Government to achieve this aim. 

The ADI Site has immense conservation value to the nation, providing habitat for many endangered flora and fauna species and ecological communities. 

Despite continued overwhelming community opposition to any development Lend Lease were allowed to commence bulldozing land for the first suburb, called Ropes Crossing, in December 2004. Lend Lease believes it will finish its St Marys project around 2016.

Despite development commencing ADI RAG have vowed to fight on to ensure that the best outcomes for residents and the environment are considered and achieved.

There are still many ways in which we can be involved in the planning process for the site. The Planning Instrument, Sydney Regional Environmental Plan 30 St Marys, (SREP 30) that zones the site to allow development is to be amended in the future. With enough pressure from the public the Rees Government or an incoming O'Farrell Government could rezone more of the ADI Site as Regional Park, therefore, protecting more land from development.

It is up to each of us to put pressure on the State Government and the Opposition to achieve these changes.

This website aims to provide you with information about the ADI Site, our campaign, the politics behind the decisions that have allowed Lend Lease to develop this land and how we can save more of the site.

 «top