City of Parramatta Councillor Paul Noack’s fight to preserve publicly owned land at Wentworth Point for open space and recreation has received unanimous support at a recent council meeting.
Families and children in Wentworth Point are now one step closer to getting the much-needed public open space they’ve been fighting so long for, following a positive response from Parramatta councillors.
Cr Noack, who filed the notice of motion to call for the land to be handed back to the public, said it was the most important motion he has put forward in his history at the council.
“Wentworth Point is the second largest suburb in the Local Government Area (LGA) and, according to the latest Census, the fastest growing suburb, but Wentworth Point virtually has no infrastructure,” he said.
In 2014, the NSW Department of Planning and Environment approved the rezoning plans for the land in the northern end of the Wentworth Point peninsula, as part of the Wentworth Point Priority Precinct.
This included plans for housing, a new primary school, marina and a 3.9 hectare Peninsular Park.
In late 2020, the NSW Government announced that a portion of the development site would be allocated for the new Sydney Olympic Park High School to accommodate up to 1,500 students, along with more residential development.
The new plans would mean a “significant reduction” in the overall size of the Peninsula Park.
Cr Noack said this simply isn’t good enough for the community.
“There was an agreement going way back to 2014 for a 3.9 hectare Peninsula Park and a marina, with the inclusion now of the new high school that Peninsula Park is now around two hectares,” he said.
“We see this community at Wentworth Point that is being denied what was promised and they’re rightly angered.”
Cr Noack said it would be an “absolute planning disaster” if the land was not given back to the people of Wentworth Point for public use and urged action on the matter.
“The return to the community of the mixed-use land has to be non-negotiable if this community is going to be treated with respect,” Cr Noack said.
“This is public land, it has to stay with the public.”
Councillors Patricia Prociv, Kellie Darley and Dan Siviero all backed Cr Noack’s call for the land to be returned.
Cr Prociv slammed the State Government and said it must treat the community more fairly.
“The State Government should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves, they have been promising Wentworth Point Peninsula Park since 2014,” Cr Prociv said.
“It’s just so not fair [for] the people of Wentworth Point, a really strong community.”
The council approved an advocacy program to the NSW Government to convert the part of the site at Wentworth Point, currently proposed to be redeveloped by TfNSW, to public open space purposes.
Ellie Busby is a news reporter for Western Sydney Publishing Group. A graduate of the University of Hertfordshire and Western Sydney University, she is a journalism Major. Ellie has worked with Universal Media, The Cova Project and for a range of other organisations. In 2024, Ellie was named Young Writer of the Year at the Mumbrella Publish Awards.