Riverlea (Buckland Park) | 12,000 dwellings | $3b

[rev]

there was a power outage Thursday afternoon affecting most of Two Wells/Virginia.. And the new traffic lights were out. There's going to be multiple fatalities at that intersection before they build an overpass.

It's almost as if the police don't attend when there's major outages and direct traffic...............

[rev]

I don't think these have been posted before.

Walker Plots First Retail Centre at $3bn Estate



Walker Corporation has lodged plans for a seven-building retail precinct at the heart of its $3-billion Riverlea housing development, which is shaping up to be South Australia’s largest master-planned community yet.

Plans for the $80-million retail precinct have been fast tracked following a surge in housing lot sales across the 1200-home masterplanned estate in north-west Adelaide in recent months.

Pending development approval, construction of the retail precinct, which will include a childcare centre, supermarket, cafes, medical services, a pilates studio and a gym, is expected to begin later this year. The first tenants are expected to take up occupancy in the first half of 2023.

Lang Walker, the sole shareholder of Walker Corporation, said the decision to bring forward the precinct’s initial retail centre was made after the company notched up sales of 700 house and land packages in just over 12 months—double what had been anticipated.

“Young couples and families are moving from well-established suburbs, wanting to bring a focus on wellness and health with them and that passion aligns perfectly with our grand vision for Riverlea,” Walker said.

“The north is changing fast and these families, who are finding it difficult to buy a two-bedroom unit in the southern suburbs, are realising they can get a four-bedroom house on a large block with room for kids and a dog for a great price at Riverlea.”

Walker’s Riverlea project, which was in planning for almost 15 years before its launch in early 2021, could take at least two decades to build out.

The greenfield project encompasses more than 1300ha of land, which the developer patiently accumulated through a series of deals.

The project has faced sustained criticism over flooding risk after the nearby Gawler River broke its banks and inundated the area in 2016.

Walker said the flood-risk debate had triggered extensive internal company discussion and work on solutions, particularly the 50ha lake system.

The masterplanned estate is now being constructed by 13 builders on behalf of Walker Corporation and upon completion will include four retail precincts, 420ha of open space and 50km of bicycle and walking trails.

At the time of its launch, house and land packages, ranging in size from 300sq m to 1000sq m, were available from $310,000.

Walker said Adelaide’s affordability compared to Sydney and Melbourne had remained one of the main drivers for the developer’s sustained lot sales.

“One of the pleasing trends we are witnessing is a movement to Riverlea from suburbs right across Adelaide,” Walker said.

“This trend is seeing people from the south now looking towards the north for their new home.”

Adelaide is fast becoming one of Australia's most desirable capital cities after notching the fifth-highest increase in house price values in 2021.

The city’s house prices surged by 25 per cent last year, with the median price now $590,000, following a peak-to-trough fall in values of -0.2 per cent at the onset of the pandemic.

The masterplanned estate is one of a number of high profile projects Walker s currently undertaking.

Walker’s interests stretch from office towers in Sydney and Melbourne to a 30,000-lot land bank of greenfield housing across Australia, three extensive housing estates under development in Malaysia, and Kokomo, a high-profile private island resort in Fiji.

The developer is also well advanced on its $2.7-billion Parramatta Square redevelopment, which includes four towers, premium-grade office space, a multi-level retail podium and civic building, as well as a university campus.

[[Shuz]]

Swap the people out with mosquitoes and that would be a more accurate render of the area.

[ChillyPhilly]

Can't wait for another shopping centre surrounded by vast tracts of pointless carparking.

[Mpol02]

The renders really do this justice. I’ve seen what West Lakes was portrayed to be and how it’s turned out. It’s far from bad but the areas that look cheap, the renders elevate and simply to make them look sleek. This will look five years dated once it’s built.

[SBD]

Can't wait for another shopping centre surrounded by vast tracts of pointless carparking.

There are not vast expanses of parking in the renders, even the wide view, nor in the "masterplan" image on the Riverlea website. It's not clear from the article whether this is the District Retail and Employment Centre (next to Port Wakefield Road) or a Neighbourhood Shopping Centre (deeper into the estate, next to the lake/storm water drain.

I kind of like the Mawson Lakes centre that has the carpark in the middle instead of around the edge, or the Gawler Woolworths+Big W that has most of the carpark underneath. A pedestrian doesn't seem to have to walk though as much carpark desert as at Elizabeth or Parabanks for example.

Hmm - probably off topic, but Elizabeth was presumably "masterplanned" in the 1950s. I wonder what the plan was then compared to how it has turned out 70 years later.

[Algernon]

Can't wait for another shopping centre surrounded by vast tracts of pointless carparking.

There are not vast expanses of parking in the renders, even the wide view, nor in the "masterplan" image on the Riverlea website. It's not clear from the article whether this is the District Retail and Employment Centre (next to Port Wakefield Road) or a Neighbourhood Shopping Centre (deeper into the estate, next to the lake/storm water drain.

I kind of like the Mawson Lakes centre that has the carpark in the middle instead of around the edge, or the Gawler Woolworths+Big W that has most of the carpark underneath. A pedestrian doesn't seem to have to walk though as much carpark desert as at Elizabeth or Parabanks for example.

Hmm - probably off topic, but Elizabeth was presumably "masterplanned" in the 1950s. I wonder what the plan was then compared to how it has turned out 70 years later.

When they teach the story of Elizabeth in planning, they try to frame it as some master planned new town development that got swallowed up by suburbia. As the story goes, the whole idea of it being a "new town" was a flawed concept, because it was always bound to end up a suburb dependent on the rest of adelaide, especially as it was nestled between already existing areas like salisbury, smithfield, gawler etc. Funnily enough, its proposed name in the planning stage was actually Munno Para. In answer to your question - was it masterplanned? Yes. In answer to the second question how it turned out 70 years later, that's got less to do with the plan and more to do with the economics and government involvement in the project. Very simply, the key "developer" of the residential component of elizabeth was the sa housing trust. In those days, the housing trust wasn't welfare, rather it was to complement the migration strategy of importing a lot of English mechanical labour to develop the manufacturing sector in the state (which was huge in those days). The "issue" if you will was that once the housing trust lost this focus (dwindlng migration) the existing stock was something that the government owned, didn't need for the original purpose, so they repurposed as state housing instead. Over time, the demographics shifted from a workers town to something where welfare dependent groups became over represented in the local population.

[ChillyPhilly]

Can't wait for another shopping centre surrounded by vast tracts of pointless carparking.

There are not vast expanses of parking in the renders, even the wide view, nor in the "masterplan" image on the Riverlea website. It's not clear from the article whether this is the District Retail and Employment Centre (next to Port Wakefield Road) or a Neighbourhood Shopping Centre (deeper into the estate, next to the lake/storm water drain.

I kind of like the Mawson Lakes centre that has the carpark in the middle instead of around the edge, or the Gawler Woolworths+Big W that has most of the carpark underneath. A pedestrian doesn't seem to have to walk though as much carpark desert as at Elizabeth or Parabanks for example.

Hmm - probably off topic, but Elizabeth was presumably "masterplanned" in the 1950s. I wonder what the plan was then compared to how it has turned out 70 years later.

When they teach the story of Elizabeth in planning, they try to frame it as some master planned new town development that got swallowed up by suburbia. As the story goes, the whole idea of it being a "new town" was a flawed concept, because it was always bound to end up a suburb dependent on the rest of adelaide, especially as it was nestled between already existing areas like salisbury, smithfield, gawler etc. Funnily enough, its proposed name in the planning stage was actually Munno Para. In answer to your question - was it masterplanned? Yes. In answer to the second question how it turned out 70 years later, that's got less to do with the plan and more to do with the economics and government involvement in the project. Very simply, the key "developer" of the residential component of elizabeth was the sa housing trust. In those days, the housing trust wasn't welfare, rather it was to complement the migration strategy of importing a lot of English mechanical labour to develop the manufacturing sector in the state (which was huge in those days). The "issue" if you will was that once the housing trust lost this focus (dwindlng migration) the existing stock was something that the government owned, didn't need for the original purpose, so they repurposed as state housing instead. Over time, the demographics shifted from a workers town to something where welfare dependent groups became over represented in the local population.

Vast areas of carparking will never be shown in renders, but I can guarantee it will be there because this is a development built on 1960s ideas with absolutely zero provision for public or active transport. It is a trite development that should never have been approved, or even seriously considered.

Correct about Elizabeth. While the socioeconomic status of the area has changed since its inception, the root ethnic heritage hasn't, with it being the largest proportion of English-born and heritage in Adelaide.

[SBD]

Can't wait for another shopping centre surrounded by vast tracts of pointless carparking.

There are not vast expanses of parking in the renders, even the wide view, nor in the "masterplan" image on the Riverlea website. It's not clear from the article whether this is the District Retail and Employment Centre (next to Port Wakefield Road) or a Neighbourhood Shopping Centre (deeper into the estate, next to the lake/storm water drain.

I kind of like the Mawson Lakes centre that has the carpark in the middle instead of around the edge, or the Gawler Woolworths+Big W that has most of the carpark underneath. A pedestrian doesn't seem to have to walk though as much carpark desert as at Elizabeth or Parabanks for example.

Hmm - probably off topic, but Elizabeth was presumably "masterplanned" in the 1950s. I wonder what the plan was then compared to how it has turned out 70 years later.

When they teach the story of Elizabeth in planning, they try to frame it as some master planned new town development that got swallowed up by suburbia. As the story goes, the whole idea of it being a "new town" was a flawed concept, because it was always bound to end up a suburb dependent on the rest of adelaide, especially as it was nestled between already existing areas like salisbury, smithfield, gawler etc. Funnily enough, its proposed name in the planning stage was actually Munno Para. In answer to your question - was it masterplanned? Yes. In answer to the second question how it turned out 70 years later, that's got less to do with the plan and more to do with the economics and government involvement in the project. Very simply, the key "developer" of the residential component of elizabeth was the sa housing trust. In those days, the housing trust wasn't welfare, rather it was to complement the migration strategy of importing a lot of English mechanical labour to develop the manufacturing sector in the state (which was huge in those days). The "issue" if you will was that once the housing trust lost this focus (dwindlng migration) the existing stock was something that the government owned, didn't need for the original purpose, so they repurposed as state housing instead. Over time, the demographics shifted from a workers town to something where welfare dependent groups became over represented in the local population.

Your attitude to Elizabeth is exposed in your last sentence. I've only lived in the area for a bit over three decades after I was employed by one of the major employers in the area (I still am). I know people who have lived in their current home since before I was born! They were part of that immigrant working class and "the demographics shifted" because they have retired and are now on aged pensions. Superannuation then was not what it is today.

[Algernon]

There are not vast expanses of parking in the renders, even the wide view, nor in the "masterplan" image on the Riverlea website. It's not clear from the article whether this is the District Retail and Employment Centre (next to Port Wakefield Road) or a Neighbourhood Shopping Centre (deeper into the estate, next to the lake/storm water drain.

I kind of like the Mawson Lakes centre that has the carpark in the middle instead of around the edge, or the Gawler Woolworths+Big W that has most of the carpark underneath. A pedestrian doesn't seem to have to walk though as much carpark desert as at Elizabeth or Parabanks for example.

Hmm - probably off topic, but Elizabeth was presumably "masterplanned" in the 1950s. I wonder what the plan was then compared to how it has turned out 70 years later.

When they teach the story of Elizabeth in planning, they try to frame it as some master planned new town development that got swallowed up by suburbia. As the story goes, the whole idea of it being a "new town" was a flawed concept, because it was always bound to end up a suburb dependent on the rest of adelaide, especially as it was nestled between already existing areas like salisbury, smithfield, gawler etc. Funnily enough, its proposed name in the planning stage was actually Munno Para. In answer to your question - was it masterplanned? Yes. In answer to the second question how it turned out 70 years later, that's got less to do with the plan and more to do with the economics and government involvement in the project. Very simply, the key "developer" of the residential component of elizabeth was the sa housing trust. In those days, the housing trust wasn't welfare, rather it was to complement the migration strategy of importing a lot of English mechanical labour to develop the manufacturing sector in the state (which was huge in those days). The "issue" if you will was that once the housing trust lost this focus (dwindlng migration) the existing stock was something that the government owned, didn't need for the original purpose, so they repurposed as state housing instead. Over time, the demographics shifted from a workers town to something where welfare dependent groups became over represented in the local population.

Your attitude to Elizabeth is exposed in your last sentence. I've only lived in the area for a bit over three decades after I was employed by one of the major employers in the area (I still am). I know people who have lived in their current home since before I was born! They were part of that immigrant working class and "the demographics shifted" because they have retired and are now on aged pensions. Superannuation then was not what it is today.

I used neutral language because I'm neutral on it. Aged pensions is a welfare group (it's not a dirty word). But hey, I won't argue the point any further beyond the basic reply here. If you live there and love it then that's awesome, because it means another person in the world is happy

[Goodsy]

Hopefully they don't have underground parking, unless they want to issue scuba diving gear for every shopper

[SBD]

Hopefully they don't have underground parking, unless they want to issue scuba diving gear for every shopper

I expect it would be fine if there is a high enough levee bank surrounding it, including a hump to drive over to get in. This would be normal design anyway I expect, to avoid too much rainfall ingress.

[Nort]

Hmm - probably off topic, but Elizabeth was presumably "masterplanned" in the 1950s. I wonder what the plan was then compared to how it has turned out 70 years later.

While ultimately flawed long term due to planning mistakes and the changing nature of work and travel, there were some good things in Elizabeth. The idea of smaller town centers spread through the city with a larger shopping precinct connected to public transport and civic facilities was a good one, however the housing of the town encouraged large blocks that meant those smaller town center shopping centers were a decent walk away from most people. With them being outside walking distance it encouraged car travel, and if you're driving to one of them it's only a short drive more to go to the town center. So Elizabeth shopping center exploded over the years as the surrounding areas shrunk, a vicious self fulfilling cycle.

As for Riverlea, the Walker quotes betray all the talk of the planning around it, and make it clear it's being designed and advertised as a suburb of Adelaide, which once the developer has moved on will require the state to step in with expensive infrastructure like public transport improvements.

[SBD]

Hmm - probably off topic, but Elizabeth was presumably "masterplanned" in the 1950s. I wonder what the plan was then compared to how it has turned out 70 years later.

While ultimately flawed long term due to planning mistakes and the changing nature of work and travel, there were some good things in Elizabeth. The idea of smaller town centers spread through the city with a larger shopping precinct connected to public transport and civic facilities was a good one, however the housing of the town encouraged large blocks that meant those smaller town center shopping centers were a decent walk away from most people. With them being outside walking distance it encouraged car travel, and if you're driving to one of them it's only a short drive more to go to the town center. So Elizabeth shopping center exploded over the years as the surrounding areas shrunk, a vicious self fulfilling cycle.

As for Riverlea, the Walker quotes betray all the talk of the planning around it, and make it clear it's being designed and advertised as a suburb of Adelaide, which once the developer has moved on will require the state to step in with expensive infrastructure like public transport improvements.

I guess when Elizabeth was planned, families had at most one car, and even the people employed at Holden might not have had one, but aspired to so had to have space for it. At least the older parts of Elizabeth have space for off-street parking for the owner's vehicles and a visitor!

I haven't seen much about what "industry" is planned or proposed near Riverlea Park. There are market gardens and packing sheds in nearby areas that probably require a lot of manual labour. Penfield and Edinburgh are not far away for higher-level employment.

It annoys me that Dan Cregan keeps talking up "Mount Barker will soon be SA's second city behind Adelaide" at the same time he is arguing for more commuter capacity between Mount Barker and Adelaide. If it's a "real city" it would have its own employment centres and only need intercity transport to Adelaide and Murray Bridge. He's arguing it is a separate city using the reasoning that it is a suburb of Adelaide.

[Nort]

It's already well established in Adelaide that cities can be suburbs of Adelaide, we have over a dozen "cities" already.