Council back to the drawing board on Gore Hill facility
Willoughby City Council has been forced to look into constructing a smaller indoor sports centre at Gore Hill Oval after it was revealed the project has a significant shortfall in funding.
Latest estimates for the project, endorsed in March 2021, indicate the cost to build the current plan would be $72.5 million, close to $28m above Council’s current available funding of $44.7m.
The original concept design included six indoor multi-sports courts, a sports hall, gym, a multi-purpose area for meetings and clubs, a café, retail space and 181 carparking spaces.
While the plans were initially costed at $57.9 million, several factors including the increase in material costs, labour shortages and the rise in inflation rates globally has seen a blowout in the project’s forecast budget.
“Whilst it was always anticipated the funding gap would be closed out with grant funding, the magnitude of this gap has increased in-line with the increased construction cost, and the possible landscape to receive grants of this size appears to be less likely,” Council staff wrote in a report.
As such, councillors were briefed in October on possible alternatives, including reducing the size of the project in line with available funding.
A smaller centre would still see six new indoor courts; however, the sports hall, gym and retail space would be scrapped. The overall footprint of the building would also be reduced by 1,000 square metres.
Onsite parking would be cut from 181 to 100 spaces, with the Pacific Highway and the carpark to the north of the site likely to accommodate overflow.
Staff will now proceed with developing a business case for a smaller scale development, with the report expected to come back to the Council in March 2023.
In the meantime, Council will write to the Member for North Sydney, Kylea Tink, and the Member for Willoughby, Tim James, urging them to fund the shortfall for the project through grant opportunities.