Not Going for a ?Song

BY ROGER HANNEY

A meeting of the City of Sydney’s Central Sydney Planning Committee (CSPC) scheduled for last Thursday was cancelled due to it being deemed holy unnecessary.
The sole item for consideration was a development application by Hillsong Church to build a $78M, seven-level office building and a 2,700 seat church with 679 car parking spaces in Rosebery.
Hillsong withdrew their application the day beforehand.
As part of the CSPC’s deliberations, an independent assessment of Hillsong’s proposal had been prepared by Angelini Planning Services.
According to the City of Sydney, Angelini’s assessment found that ‘the proposal exceeded height, parking and floor space limits and would exacerbate traffic problems in the surrounding residential streets. The report to the CSPC recommended refusal of the application.’
Hillsong’s general manager, George Aghajanian, replied in kind by stating that ‘we [Hillsong] disagree with the recommendation and many of the findings of the Independent Planner’s Report, and are re-evaluating our options.”
“We believe we have a strong case in defending our application,’ Mr Aghajanian said. ‘And we will continue discussions with Council about finding a way forward for a church in the Green Square precinct.”
Close to 80 per cent of the 1092 submissions received by CSPC were supportive of Hillsong’s proposal.