SCEGGS Darlinghurst - Adaptive re-use of Wilkinson House

the traffic both during constructon and after needs to be addressed. even now the traffic in Forbes St during school drop of and pick up is such that i around 3pm am in a traffic jam to get to my home at the horizon. i ask that during construction and afterwards during school morning drop off and pickup that there be a lollipop man on the new pedestrian raising on the forbes st crossing at clapton place - otherwise with pedestrian right of way the cars will be stuck ie have a lollipop person both across forbest and the entry to Clapton Place. also school should have a turn around - otherwise SCEGGS cars enter Horizon to turn ie trepassing on our busy property anyway.
the traffic issues have to be adjusted to manage the chaos in Forbes St. (for the record the website terms and conditions link does not work - i have ticked i read but in fact it is impossible for me to read as the link says the document cannot be found) - i only ticked so i could make this submission.

also the hours of construction for this project - it shoudl be a condition of consent that there be no noise on the working days and saturdays between Christmas and New year - as this is when residents are on holidays at home and do not want jackhammering at 7am! noise should not happen during this christimas season - and for other times of year - not occur before 9am of any saturday of a long weekend.

I live opposite SCEGGS and my apartment faces Forbes Street and the school. In principle I support the project, now that it has become one of adaptive use of Wilkinson House, as opposed to demolition of a historically and architecturally significant building. In fact, I am delighted by the beautiful design the Smart Design Studio has created.
However, I have concerns over construction noise.

Construction: there are no details in this SCEGGS submission regarding hours of work and therefore no information about the days and hours construction noise will have to be endured by the residents of the Horizon. A gap in communications tends to get filled with negative anticipation, for example that construction activity will be concentrated in weekends and school holidays, in the hours before and after school - times corresponding with when people are at home. Surely it's not too much to ask to be provided with specific and detailed information on intended days and hours of work?
Also, it has been pointed out by our consultant planner who is making a submission on behalf of the Horizon owners corporation, that the noise of construction at ground level and above 5 floors, does not comply with the construction noise standards. Standards exist for a reason and this SCEGGS development should not be allowed to ignore them.

Thank you for taking the time to read my submission.

Please find attached

Written Objection – SSD 8993 – Mod 3 – SCEGGS Darlinghurst Concept

I wish to comment on Modification 3 to the Approved Concept Plan for SCEGGS Darlinghurst, and planned works associated with the adaptive re-use of Wilkinson House.

I have reviewed the documents provided and have a particular concern regarding amended road safety requirements for future development applications.

No justification is provided for the proposal to undertake a design-based Road Safety Audit to replace the previously required Road Safety Evaluation.

It is my understand that the effect of this change would be to limit the scope of the traffic management review associated those associated with the construction works. The approach would not take account of the impact of current traffic movements, and focus narrowly on the impact of traffic generated by the construction works.

I live in the Horizon, directly opposite SCEGGS. Traffic management is a longstanding and unresolved issue with the school. Residents have for many years sought the assistance of the school to better manage student drop off and collection, and the movement of buses required to take students to extra-curricula activities. Without any success.

The SCEGGS management has been consistently unhelpful in addressing concerns. Finally in 2020, with the assistance of the office of the Lord Mayor, residents met with the Principal, who was asked by the Lord Mayor to take steps to better manage the traffic generated by school activities. The school failed to respond to this request.

As a consequence, the City of Sydney is now finalising a traffic management review of Forbes and Bourke Streets, which I understand will place new requirements on the school. Given this long history, and clear evidence of an existing problem, it would be entirely unacceptable to limit the scope of the traffic management review required for this development to consider only the impact of traffic associated with the construction works.

As an example, currently up to six large buses arrive in the afternoon to take students to after school activities. The relatively constrained Forbes Street is adversely impacted by this. It would be inconceivable to permit buses to use Forbes Street for collection and drop off whilst construction is underway.

Currently SCEGGS controls public access to St Peters Street Darlinghurst. This is a public street, with boom gates that only permit vehicular access during school drop off and collection times. The public cannot use the street at night, on weekends and during holiday periods. Additionally, bollards have been placed at the end of Forbes Street, preventing vehicular access to Premier Lane.

I believe a condition of consent for the development should be that St Peters Street is made accessible to the public at all times, and that the bollards be removed from the end of Forbes Street to provide an additional egress point for the current and future levels of traffic generated in large part by the school.

In summary, the traffic management plan for the redevelopment works proposed should require SCEGGS to resolve existing traffic management issues as part of the wider consideration of traffic management associated with the planned works. This can be achieved by maintaining the existing requirement for Condition B12 (d).

I ask that you also liaise with the City of Sydney regarding its traffic management review of Forbes and Bourke Streets, which I believe is close to completion. This needs to be taken into account in the approval requirements for this site. The contact officer is the Chief Engineer, George Angelis.

Thank you for your consideration of this submission.

Yours sincerely,


Peter Morton

I have had some trouble accessing the relevant details for the project, however, i believe the traffic impact assessment for the DA is seriously deficient as it has not addressed the requirements of the condition B12 which require a new traffic impact assessment for each DA for the site (for all construction and operations stages) including an updated green travel plan for the site.
The New DA for the Wilkinson House redevelopment should be rejected until this information is recieved. In particular a draft Construction Traffic Management Plan should be prepared, to allow the nearby residents to comment and provide input to the proposed construction traffic management, in particular for the following items.
Most weekdays, there is effectively zero vacant on street parking on Forbes Street, so the School will have to provide on site parking either on the school site or on other land leased by the school for all construction workers who intend to drive vehicles to the site.
On street loading or unloading of trucks in Forbes street will not be acceptable due to adverse noise and related amenity impacts for the residential properties on the other side of Forbes Street.
No truck movements related to the site construction actiivity shall be permitted to occur outside the periods 7 am to 5 pm on weekdays, with no trucks using Forbes Street on either weekends or public holidays.
The proposed external lift tower for the building will have unacceptable visual impacts for the residential properties and will only be acceptable if it is located on the western side of the building and no part of it is visible above the roof height of the building
The additional attic-rooftop level of development at the building should only be permissible on the grounds that it replaces the need for the other proposed admin building on the site masterplan (new building on the eastern side of Barham House) If this attic level rooftop development is permitted for the Wilkinson House building, the other proposed new office building should be completely removed from the approved site masterplan and the eastern and northern facades of the 1834 Barham House including the grounds should be restored as close as possible to the original 1834 condition, to restore the public views from the footpath level of Forbes Street to this building which is one of the earliest and most architecturally significant early European-Colonial era buildings remaining in this area of Sydney.