Review of Blacktown City Council's Contributions Plan no 22 - Rouse Hill

IPART has reviewed Blacktown City Council’s revised Contributions Plan No.22 for Rouse Hill, which comprises two parts:

• CP22L - Rouse Hill (Land) includes only land for local infrastructure, and
• CP22W - Rouse Hill (Works) includes local infrastructure works and administration costs.

The plan applies to two precincts within Sydney’s North West Growth Area: Area 20 (also known as the Cudgegong Road Precinct) and the neighbouring Riverstone East Precinct.

While Stage 3 of the Riverstone East precinct is not yet rezoned, CP22 will apply to all three stages.

Our recommendations

Our recommendations would reduce total costs in the plan by $155.0 million (15.7%) from $987.6 million to $832.7 million.

The reduction in costs is primarily the result of our recommendations to:

• Reduce land costs by $45.0 million to correct for a double counting error and remove one open space reserve.
• Reduce open space embellishment costs by $87.1 million.
• Reduce stormwater management works costs (by $15.8 million) and transport works costs ($5.3 million).

We also recommend the council update its apportionment of costs based on the updated population estimate.

The indicative contributions for low density development in the plan are between $101,289 and $123,729 per lot. Our recommendations would reduce the contributions for equivalent lots to between $86,073 and $95,808.

IPART assesses councils’ contributions plans that propose local infrastructure contributions above $20,000 per lot or dwelling, or $30,000 per lot or dwelling in identified greenfield areas. The maximum contributions in CP22 exceed the $30,000 threshold that applies to the plan.

We have assessed CP22 (2018) against the criteria in DPE’s Practice Note: Local Infrastructure Contributions (January 2018). We have based our assessment on information in the plan, and further information provided by the council. We also consulted DPE and other stakeholders.

IPART has provided its report on the plan to the council and the Minister for Planning. It is available on IPART’s website: https://www.ipart.nsw.gov.au/.

In response to our recommendations, the Minister will advise the council of any required changes. The council must make the changes to access Local Infrastructure Growth Scheme funding (available until July 2020) or charge developers the full contribution amounts (from July 2020 onwards).