Randwick panel approves six-storey Magill Street co-living project

A six-storey co-living housing development at 1-3 Magill Street, Randwick, has been approved, with the Randwick Local Planning Panel satisfied the building height variation was justified. The project will include 82 private rooms, basement parking, bicycle and motorcycle spaces, landscaping and site works.

The panel accepted the applicant’s written request to vary the height standard in clause 4.3 of Randwick Local Environmental Plan 2012. It said compliance would be unreasonable and unnecessary in the circumstances and that there were sufficient environmental planning grounds to justify the variation. Consent was granted under section 4.16(3) of the Environmental Planning and Assessment Act 1979.

The site will be cleared before the new building goes up. The approval covers basement parking for nine vehicles, including one accessible space and two car-share spaces, plus 41 bicycle spaces and 17 motorcycle spaces.

The panel also ordered a series of design changes before the project can proceed. Those include a waste chute system on all residential levels, or another waste method from the NSW EPA’s Better Practice Guide to Resource Recovery, plus changes to the level 5 dormer and communal area.

It also required additional skylights for level 5 private rooms, privacy treatments to balustrades and glazing, a maximum 1.8m height for side and rear boundary fencing, centralised air-conditioning, and the relocation of a condenser intake vent near the backyard of Unit UD01.

The panel said the 6-storey scale was suitable because the site combines two lots and sits in a locality undergoing transition. It said the proposal was consistent with the relevant objectives of the planning controls and would adequately protect resident amenity, subject to the design amendments.

Before any construction certificate can be issued, the amended plans must be submitted to and approved by Council’s Manager Development Assessment. A landscape management plan is also required before that stage, and it must be implemented for the life of the development.

The Magill Street approval was one of three decisions made by the panel on 9 July 2026. The same meeting also granted a modified approval for 30-32 Moore Street, Coogee, and deferred a proposal for 21 Cook Street, Randwick.