NW infrastructure access issue

AMID the host of recent announcements regarding land releases and developments in the Pilbara, disparities between demand and supply, poor access to infrastructure services and lengthy bureaucratic processes are hindering progress in the north-west.

Last week, the state government announced Mirvac as the developer for Karratha’s $1.5 billion ‘City of the North’ facelift, which will deliver a 1,500 dwelling coastal suburb to the town, among other facilities.

At the time of the announcement, Mirvac chief executive Evan Campbell estimated between 600 and 800 new dwellings each year for four years would be required across the Pilbara; he said the Karratha project would be critical to satisfying that demand.

Transportable housing company McGrath Homes business development manager, Dominic Youel, works with major mining players on their feasibility studies and sets a higher estimate.

Mr Youel believes that, outside of single-person quarters, 2,000 extra houses could be required by four of the north-west’s miners alone over the next three to five years.

“This number does not take into consideration any smaller resource companies and suppliers that are associated with any of these projects,” he said.

Mr Youel said Karratha was one regional city where land release was being held up by lack of infrastructure.

“There is a lot of land that has been proposed to be released in Karratha over the next four or five years but there are a lot of problems with preparing the sites and getting services out there such as water, power etc,” he said.

LandCorp flagged those issues in its May 2011 Pilbara Dialogue report, as did last year’s Regional Hotspots Land Supply Update from the Department of Planning and the WA Planning Commission.

The hotspots report said population growth, serviced land, housing scarcity and constrained infrastructure were among Karratha’s greatest current challenges.

“The limited capacity of Karratha’s infrastructure is imposing critical constraints on residential, industrial and business growth, although major upgrades are in progress or planned,” the report said.

Among the planned projects are Nickol West – a 200-lot green title development to commence in 2012 and the Tambrey Neighbourhood Centre – a 10-hectare mixed-use development under the Pilbara Cities initiative, which was assigned to a consortium proponent made up of three partners including Adrian Fini’s FJM Equities in May.

The Lazy Lands project is a three-stage release of crown land to the private market for residential development; seven of its 61 parcels of land were released in stage one, while the remainder await work that is required to create easements, understand drainage and flooding issues.

Karratha isn’t the only town experiencing land supply and demand issues, however.

In an announcement last week, Planning Minister John Day said Onslow – the nearest township to Chevron’s approved Wheatstone project – had the potential to treble its residential population over the next five years.

And with plans for a 350-600 lot subdivision in 2012 and a 75-lot infill development for this year the only land releases in sight, it is unclear how this need will be catered to.

“You hear of proposed land releases, it’s going to come, but just trying to get an indication of a date is difficult,” Mr Youel said.