37-41 Oxford Street, Epping NSW 2121

This development should be scrapped from the 2017 plans put forward with this application.
A major development of a retirement village plus a new Primary school has been approved on the grounds of the Catholic church Our Lady Help of Christians located at 29 Forest Grove Epping and building starts in February 2020 this is right alongside this proposed new development-what a nightmare!!
Oxford Street is already a problem with local residents having "nowhere" to park along Oxford St to get to the Post office Chemist Warehouse Dentist Cafe's and necessities of daily life.
We already have exits onto Oxfords Street from high rise new blocks of units already built opposite 29 Oxford St Epping plus older unit blocks already built traffic coming out onto Oxford Street Epping. Head on collisions here we come with several high rise blocks exits coming lot onto Oxford street Epping already.

And where are the "green spaces" planned for the occupant children and families of these several blocks of units to have space to stretch out.
Absolutely none from what I can see of the plans
Then if that isn't enough a few paces down opposite Epping station we have three towers: 27 floors 23 floors and 20 floors not far off completion. Where are the green spaces planned for them. Where do the children play living in these unit blocks?

Epping has enough of this "over development" done over these past seven years( since 2014) of well over ten thousand units already built and continuing.

The Commission recently suggested at the end of 2021 ( when they approved the "Austino development " located from corner of Forest Grove Epping/Blaxland Rd Epping up to former Epping Bowling Club -still zoned "Open Space) and strongly recommended that this "Open Space" -the former Epping Bowling Club needed to be purchased for Community use.

I rest my case for this building application to be denied.

In a space of about 4 years, we have several high rise buildings completed on Oxford and Cambridge Street--B1, Poly Horizons, Oxford Central and Langston; plus Epica and the redevelopment of the church opposite Oxford Central into yet another high rise building. Residents in the area, in addition to the dense population and traffic problems, complain about the lack of community and shopping facilities. The swimming pool should be relocated from its present far-off location to where the major Epping population is.

Also the high concentration of population along Oxford and Cambridge streets means it is much harder for parents in neighbouring areas in Epping to send their kids to good schools such as Cheltenham and Epping Boys. They have their catchment areas drastically shrinked in the past 2 years.

The proposed redevelopment at 37-41 Oxford street adds oil to the fire and thus should be disapproved.

Epping Bridge is most congested road in Sydney by adding more units will have disaster to already to the traffic in Epping

I object to the submission because of how densely populated this building will be and how negatively this will impact the surrounding areas. The application is once again extending past the height breach of 72 metres to cause more overshadowing, being too greedy in the car spaces it is trying to add in and differing away from the outcome of encouraging public transport. This will not protect the amenity of the adjoining residential homes on site and the surroundings.

1) Overreach of the approved car spaces.
It is a vast overreach by adding an additional 2 basement parking levels, as it will add even more traffic to Oxford St and the surrounding areas. The proposed height breaching tower is already so densely packed with apartments with the existing 4 levels basement carpark that anymore is too much to add into one lot of land.
It is also recognised that the applicant isn't simply asking for 2 additional levels, but also around an additional 40% expansion to the level 4 basement. This means all together, this is around a 66% increase to the car spaces for vehicles, which is far beyond what was initially proposed.
37-41 Oxford st should not have been approved in the first place for such a tall densely populated tower within a relatively small lot of land. Not only will this add more overpopulation to one lot of land, it will cause more traffic to the area and more lines at the traffic lights surrounding Epping.
In reference to the Statement of Environmental Effects - 37-41 Oxford Street Epping_PAN-172740.pdf, the applicant proposal also disingenuously suggests 2 additional basement levels will only add 18 car spaces, when in truth it will add much more.

2) Adding car spaces is against the objectives of recommending public transport.
The desired outcomes of the Hornsby Development Control Plan 2013, section 1C.2.1, is for “Development that manages transport demand around transit nodes to encourage public transport usage”. In addition, the objectives of a B2 zone according to Parramatta Local Environmental Plan is “To maximise public transport patronage and encourage walking and cycling”.
The proposal to add additional car spaces is in contradiction to the statements above, and will undermine the planning outcomes as it will lead to more cars on the road and less use of public transport.
In addition, the applicant’s own words “The development is located proximate to other essential services within Epping town centre…and as such, will encourage walking and cycling”. Adding additional car spaces will not encourage walking and cycling in this area.
The huge increase in car spaces and basement levels does not promote more use of public transport. The initial approval of this 30 story tower should be revised to have significantly less storeys to be in line with the height limits in the Epping town centre.

3) Units to cars pace to unit ratio is too high.
To show perspective, the car space to units ratio proposed for 37-41 Oxford St, even considering the car spaces to be used for retail and commercial businesses, is high and disproportionate to the rest of the area. If using the metric of homes, in this case units in the tower, considering visitor space and retail/commercial space, the ratio is 1.43 car spaces to 1 unit. This is too high. When compared to the already built towers in the Epping town centre, 35 Oxford St has 1.23 car spaces to 1 unit; and a more reasonable ratio of 0.99 car spaces to 1 unit at 12-22 Langston Place. Better consideration is required to reduce the significant increase in traffic, and promote the usage of public transport. As seen in the table below, the context shown is the other towers in Epping do not try to pack as many car spaces into one lot of land.

4) Further height breach.
The proposed amendment causes more concern for building height breaches. As defined, the building height limit in that area of the Epping town centre is set at 72 metres by HLEP 2013. The proposed building unfortunately is 95.7m high, representing a height breach of around 33%, and now seeks to continue breaching height limits by further extending past the height limit.
Anything above the blue dashed line in the proposed diagrams below is overreach. Squeezing in one more structure onto the rooftop envelope is unnecessary and will further add to the overshadowing to all affected homes. In the interest of avoiding more height breach concerns, it should cap the height to what was previously defined.

I and my family strongly object to this DA application (DA/1/2022) -- 37-41 Oxford Street Epping

1. Oxford Street and its surrounding areas are already over-populated and suffer from traffic congestion. Since 2018, way too many high rise buildings completed on Oxford/Cambridge Streets:

• Jardines Residence, 35 Oxford St,
• Oxford Central, 2 towers,
• Poly Horizons, 3 towers,
• Langston, 3 towers,
• B1 Chester St,
• Avendia, 22 Essex St

Plus projects in progress or approved:

• Origin, 1 Crandon St,
• 48 Pembroke St,
• Epica,
• 45-53 Oxford St, 16 storey,
• 29 Oxford St, 175 units + 132 beds (residential aged care)

We already have more than a fair share of high rise property developments on this side of Epping Town Centre. Future developments of high rise buildings should be on the other side of Epping Town Centre.

2. With the huge increase in residential units and population, there has not been a corresponding increase/improvement in community amenities/facilities. The existing library is too small and ill-equipped for the population increase. Sporting facilities such as football/soccer pitches, basketball courts are still missing. Green/open spaces per head are drastically shrinking.

Also, we are in dire need of a shopping centre, more shops, eateries of different tastes, commercial/office spaces. There is no branch from the big 4 banks. WE DO NOT WANT MORE TALL CONCRETE RESIDENTIAL TOWERS.

3. Traffic is already a big headache. Every morning when I drive my kids to school (Cheltenham Girls' High), it takes at least 3 traffic lights, if not 4, to exit from Essex St onto Epping Rd and then onto Beecroft Rd. Also, during peak hours especially in the afternoon, there is always a long queue of cars on Blaxland Rd to go onto Langston Place. On average it takes 3 or 4 traffic lights to pass through. With people moving into Langston, (bear in mind additional 464 units), the traffic problems will get worse. The redevelopments at 29 Oxford St and 37-41 Oxford St into high rise buildings (386 units + 132 beds for residential aged care + childcare centre for 60 kids, plus a total of 632 car spaces) will further exacerbate the already worsen traffic problems. The traffic impact report submitted by the developer, Meriton, has not addressed the “summative impacts” i.e., the impacts of all the traffic generated by the proposed project and the other residential towers in the neighbouring area, especially on Oxford/Cambridge streets.

4. The most disturbing issue of all is the height of the building -- 30 storeys reaching 97.5 m -- well exceed the prescribed 72 m height limit by 33%. “Reasons” given by the developer are not valid nor convincing -- Quote from Meriton’s submission: “Most of the surrounding neighbouring sites are in the process of developing towards high density… Exceeding the prescribed height limit enables the tower to achieve a slim, elegant form well setback from the podium and street to allow view and light corridors.” Flimsy reasons to support exceeding the height limit by 33%.

There must be other ways of allowing view and light corridors without exceeding the height limit by a large margin. In fact, the area is experiencing excessive high-density developments in the form of ultra-high towers. This is exactly what we as residents object to. We do not see a strong justification for allowing the building to go above the prescribed height limit.

The ultra-high 30 storey building to be built at 37-41 Oxford St will effectively block most of the morning sunlight from reaching Tower B of Poly Horizon, given their close proximity. Meriton’s report does not address this issue.

5. The site areas of Oxford Central and Poly Horizons are bigger than this project at 37-41 Oxford St. But Oxford Central and Poly Horizons do not exceed the height limit. It is noted that the Council even trimmed 2 floors from Oxford Central’s initial development application to now 16 storeys. With a smaller site area at 37-41 Oxford St, building 30 storeys is beyond comprehension. Maximum it should only be 16 storeys to align with Oxford Central. Not to mention, this project offers a slim and tall residential tower which, as we see it, is aesthetically unsightly. Not elegant at all.

This DA application (DA/1/2022) should be disapproved.

Somehow when primary school kids go to schools using the Oxford street, Meriton always put stop signs and force kids to cross roads to the other side. However, none of them ensures kids safety when kids were forced to cross the roads to the other side. Does the council government cares more about building than kid's safety? I think this is ridiculous. Meriton needs to apologize to the entire community around the Oxford street and compensate us for all inconvenience caused to us. They should at least think of kids safety when they go to school.