A long term plan to put Wanneroo back on the map is close to completion as the city's town centre undergoes a $50-plus million redevelopment.
A long term plan to put Wanneroo back on the map is close to completion as the city's town centre undergoes a $50-plus million redevelopment.
The once-sleepy hamlet, neglected for decades in favour of the nouveau city of Joondalup as the seat of regional power, Wanneroo's town centre is now a hub of construction activity, with a $20 million library and museum, a big shopping centre expansion and $15 million recreation centre at various stages of completion.
Wanneroo mayor Jon Kelly believes the revamp, part of nearly $100 million committed to new civil works since the end of the last century, is simply allowing the town to catch up after years of playing second fiddle to Joondalup.
Mr Kelly said about 30 years ago the regional council, which then included what is now Joondalup and Wanneroo, supported state government efforts to create a new city centre at Joondalup.
"The centre strategy for the north-west corridor was to suppress activity in Wanneroo in order to force people to shop in Joondalup," he said.
"There are 100,000 square metres of net lettable space [in Joondalup] but without the population and traffic to support that.
"The theory was, if you build it they will come. The problem is, they didn't."
But Mr Kelly said since the council's split about 10 years ago, a concerted effort had been put into regenerating the old town centre of Wanneroo as part of a bid to attract economic development to a fast-growing area regarded as a dormitory city for the rest of the metropolitan Perth.
"Wanneroo is the naturally occurring regional centre," he said.
Mr Kelly said the redevelopment would draw attention to Wanneroo town site as part of a move to rebalance the economy of the region.
While commercial and retail growth in the past 20 years has mainly occurred across the western shores of Lake Joondalup, Wanneroo has become the fastest growing local authority in WA in terms of population.
However, business growth has failed to keep up. Wanneroo remains a key agriculture centre, with about $90 million in gross production a year, but that is diminishing and must be replaced as market gardens make way for residential subdivisions.
The Neerabup industrial estate offers significant growth opportunities in terms of employment in the area, but Mr Kelly believes a major piece of infrastructure is also needed as a catalyst to jobs growth.
He said that, while there had been much talk of a port or airport, such concepts were fraught with issues. Mr Kelly said he'd prefer to see something tourism related that took advantage of the northern metropolitan coastline.
Another potential drawcard is the Wanneroo Raceway, a local asset which has had its future questioned lately.
The Wanneroo mayor believes the racetrack positioning, in an industrial park, is opportune and offers synergies with automotive and vehicle-related industries.
The biggest part of the town centre revamp is the retail expansion being undertaken by construction group Perth Building Company.
The Wanneroo Shopping Centre, owned by the Lopresti family of Melbourne, is being expanded from 8,000sqm to 23,000sqm, which would place it in the top 20 shopping centres as ranked by retail area in the state, according to WA Business News Book of Lists.
The expansion will provide room for 60 specialty stores, a relocated Coles supermarket and potentially a Woolworths by 2011.
To accommodate the expansion, the city sold the shopping centre about 7,800sqm for around $1.5 million and development approval was granted in 2006. Construction started last year.
