The City of Salisbury has released its new City Plan, outlining its ambitions to drive housing growth in the north and develop industry hubs.
With the northern suburbs set to deliver much of Adelaide’s future housing growth under the state government’s Greater Adelaide Regional Plan (GARP), the City of Salisbury is positioning itself to take advantage of the anticipated boom.
Salisbury has unveiled its City Plan 2040 – a document guiding the city’s aspirations to “transform itself as a destination city for South Australians to live, work and play”.
There are “once-in-a-lifetime” opportunities for Salisbury, the plan reads, to use its availability of land for “economic expansion unmatched in greater Adelaide”.
This includes developing new infill and mixed housing envisioned under the GARP along the Walkleys Road Corridor, at Lake Windemere and the already announced $200 million mixed-use redevelopment of Salisbury City Centre.
There’s a focus on industry too, with the development of an eco-industrial precinct west of Port Wakefield Road considered by the City Plan, which the council proposes should be given status in the GARP as a ‘National Employment Cluster’.
“The GARP and the City Plan are highly aligned in the ambition and aim to capitalise on the unprecedented opportunities,” Salisbury Mayor Gillian Aldridge told InDaily.
“Opportunities for where to work, opportunities for where to do business.”
Aldridge said Salisbury was moving into a new phase, and hoped the City Plan would make it “the best city in the state”.
“I tend to think it already is,” she said.
“I want it to be a place where people can live happily and safely. I want affordable housing for everyone.
“We are building 220 houses on the Walkleys Road Corridor and at Lake Windemere. Personally, I think it’s a perfect opportunity for someone who moved here 58 years ago to their quarter acre block but can no longer manage it, to be able to move right in and live in the City of Salisbury, have their shops, their doctors, their friends, everything they need down the end of a lift.”
The $200 million redevelopment of Salisbury City Centre will get underway in 2025. Render: Supplied.
The council is making direct investments in new housing and is helping to unlock land for new developments as well.
“It’s important that we build what our community wants,” Aldridge said.
While the City Plan is more of a vision statement than an expression of concrete plans, it does outline some key actions the council is set to explore over the coming years.
This includes an investigation into the opportunity to “develop and host a new large arts/cultural event” that “celebrates people from different backgrounds”.
Further, rolling out CCTV cameras at “key locations across the city centres and recreational spaces” is another goal, as is signing up to Green Adelaide’s Urban Greening Strategy whereby the Council will look to increase tree cover across Salisbury.
In addition to the $200 million upgrade for Salisbury City Centre, the council will prepare a precinct plan for Ingle Farm, which could include public realm upgrades and mixed-use developments.
Aldridge said the plan comes at an “opportune moment” for Salisbury.
“The north will be the epicentre of economic and social growth in Adelaide in the next 15-20 years,” she said.
“We are at an opportune moment with a merging of a number of opportunities to build jobs, housing and social wellbeing.
“We have substantial land available to support current and future economic development; we are investing significantly in growing housing and economic activity; and we have excellent and growing recreational assets that support a healthy community.
“We are keen to speed up rezoning so we can get on with easing the current housing crisis and meeting the GARP’s ambitious targets.”