Lismore’s draft Local Strategic Planning Statement sets out a bold ambition: a 33 per cent increase in residents over the next decade, along with a more than 50 per cent increase in housing stock.

The Lismore 60,000 plan, on exhibition until June 26, outlines a goal for lifting population from 44,000 to 60,000 by 2036. Mayor Steve Krieg told The Urban Developer that scale may “rattle a few people”, but “overwhelmingly, resident of Lismore want to see growth and want to see prosperity”.

Whether the plan can be adopted, and how well it can be executed with the support of both private investors and state and federal governments, will determine whether this northern NSW town, devastated by floods and struggling with homelessness, can evolve into a regional powerhouse.

Development of 10,000 new homes will accompany that growth, with 70 per cent of those earmarked for rezoned areas safe from the flooding that ravaged the region in 2022. The region’s existing 18,500 homes host an average household size of 2.4, but the draft paper projects that will decrease to 2.1 over time.

Developers are incentivised to assist with that target, and to the generation of at least 6500 new jobs, particularly in the Health Precinct where contributions will be waived. Currently, there are 26,000 jobs in the Lismore LGA. Commuters also travel to and from employment and homes in neighbouring regions, particularly Ballina.

Aspiration, connectivity, potential

Solve Property chief planner Gary White has half a century’s experience in planning, including as chief planner for the NSW and Queensland governments. He told The Urban Developer that “we’ve identified enough land to go way beyond 60,000 … that’s serviceable and suitable for urban development”.

Solve Property assisted with developing the draft, taking the aspirational view of strategic planning “not just to extrapolate what you’ve done over the last period and then do the same going forward,” White says.

“We’ve got a viable regional center 20 minutes from Ballina airport, which connects you to the rest of Australia, and an hour from South-East Queensland.

A photograph of industrial lands in Lismore

▲ Employment and housing is connected across the region and into South-East Queensland.

“All the ingredients were there to really put together a successful regional center, and hopefully get the support of the state and federal governments to align with the partnership responsibilities that they would have around that growth model.”

According to White, the community is supportive of planning that moves beyond a recovery narrative to a renewal narrative. A city the scale of Toowoomba or Ballarat is achievable within two or three decades, but “supply friction” has held back housing. Approvals, demand, and infrastructure are not correctly aligned under present planning models.

“The median house price in the Northern Rivers areas is up there with Sydney. The homelessness numbers are up there with Sydney,” White says.

“So much of what allocates the future infrastructure, the future schools, is dependent upon housing approval numbers that have been part of the history of a locality. It determines your allocation of funding from the feds and from the state.

“My real concern is that if you have one figure for demand, and another for supply, then you’re not getting a true reflection of demand for housing in northern New South Wales.

▲ Lismore has struggled with homelessness in the wake of the 2022 floods.

“You’re getting a reflection of what’s allowed to be supplied as a consequence of those friction behaviors.”

However, White says that Lismore’s plan is an opportunity to tackle some of the planning bottlenecks and set a clear direction.

“If you don’t plan and manage for change, it’s going to take you someplace else anyway,” White says.

“If you’re telling a story, those parts of the story that contribute to your core values; you’re driving your bus and you’re not a passenger of change.”

Density or village lifestyle a core question

Krieg says that the focus would be on attracting young families, and public servants, relocating to Lismore. Health workers and businesses are a key target.

“We have a base hospital and we’ve also got a private hospital and so, as a council, all we can do is offer really great affordable homes and fantastic services. And hopefully they choose to call Lismore home.”

About 45 per cent of the new housing, or 4500 homes, would be targeted towards Lismore itself, with another 35 per cent going towards the villages in the LGA. The final 2000 homes would be spread across existing approvals and zoned land.

A map of growth areas planned for Lismore

▲ The areas earmarked for growth are flood-safe or flood-resilient, but the CBD will “embrace” the river.

NSW Greens MLC and Lismore local Sue Higginson has a background as a planning and environmental lawyer, and is broadly supportive of the aspirations of the plan, particularly the economic potential of the Health Precinct.

“We should be thinking boldly about where we’re going,” Higginson says.

“But from where I sit … there are big questions around how regional communities in constrained environments are able to genuinely prosper.”

Higginson described the plan as “growth around some more housing, and the town centre is a problem area that we don’t really know how to grapple with. So what we’re going to do is place the burdens or the pressures of housing population growth onto our villages”.

“If you want to go and put more people in our villages, you need first to explain how their essential services will keep up…how are we going to deal with their waste, water, schools, transport, roads.

A photograph of the retail strip in Nimbin

▲ The plan must balance culture, densification, and services in villages such as Nimbin, Higginson said.

“All of those things are relatively silent, and the silent parts are the loudest parts.”

Higginson says that, while “planning can be really abstract and alienating for many people”, community feedback will be crucial in shaping “modern, integrated density principles”.

“You need the community to be leading the way, not technocratic planners,” Higginson says.

Enabling infrastructure holding back housing

Krieg says that infrastructure is a major concern for the council, and that he and Higginson are “good friends, but we agree to disagree on a lot of things”.

“All of her concerns are directly in her control. She’s worried about infrastructure; she’s a senator in the state government. Free up some money, get it out of Western Sydney and into the regions.

“Lismore hasn’t had sustainable growth since 1998. We can’t afford to build the infrastructure until we get a population boom. It’s very much a chicken-and-egg thing.

“Our plan is not overly ambitious or taking away from the village atmosphere … it is responsible planning, but we also need support from the state government to be able to keep up with that infrastructure.”

The Federal budget, which allocated $2 billion to enabling infrastructure for new housing (including $500 million specifically for regional projects), is “a drop in the ocean”, Krieg says.

▲ Matching infrastructure to supply is the challenge, with the Budgeted $2 billion insufficient, Krieg said.

“To build a sewage treatment plan is about $100 million. And so perspective is really important with this … we’ve got 15 regional cities in New South Wales, let alone the other towns that are desperate to upgrade their infrastructure.

“It’s an insult. It’s actually an insult to regional Australia.”

Krieg pointed to a recent approval for a six-storey apartment complex near the hospital as evidence that the council is working to produce solutions to the housing crisis.

“Those sorts of things are really exciting, and regional cities can deliver those sorts of housing solutions. But we don’t get the same recognition that metropolitan areas do as far as infrastructure.

“And that’s the great frustration. Because I know that regional cities in NSW could open up thousands of blocks of land, in 12 or 18 months, given a balanced infrastructure spend to the regions.”

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