New suburb of Southwark unveiled on West

End Brewery site

February 2025 The large vacant site which was once home to the West End Brewery will become Adelaide’s newest suburb, the SA government today announced. As reported by the ABC, the 8.4-hectare site in Thebarton will be renamed Southwark, which was the suburb’s former name. The $1-billion housing development will incorporate “up to” 1,300 homes, according to Premier Peter Malinauskas – an increase of 300 on when the project was first announced in September 2023. Situated between the inner-western suburbs of Thebarton and Hindmarsh and flanked by Port Road and the River Torrens, the site was occupied by the historic West End Brewery until its closure in 2021. The nearly 140-year-old heritage-listed Brewhouse Tower will form the development’s centrepiece and be repurposed as a hospitality and retail venue. Twenty per cent of the yet-to-be-built properties in the Southwark project will be earmarked as “affordable” – whereby eligible South Australians with low-to-moderate incomes can procure mortgages which do not exceed 30 per cent of their annual incomes. Under the state government’s current Home Seeker scheme, a selection of properties are adjusted for the market and available at a reduced price for eligible first home buyers and renters. The minister for housing and urban development Nick Champion acknowledged that at just under $500,000 – the current “affordable” property rate for Home Seeker SA applicants – that amount was “still a pretty challenging figure”. ”But for young people or first home buyers who are getting the stamp duty concession, accessing shared equity through Home Start, you can make it affordable through those measures as well,” he said. He added that prospective home-owners eligible for the 20 per cent of properties in the new suburb would get “first dibs” through the Home Seeker SA scheme. While the state government has not yet locked in a contractor to take on the project, it said civil construction was “expected to start within months, with the first residents anticipated to move in by the end of next year”. Opposition housing spokes-person Michelle Lensink criticised the Malinauskas government for its decision to buy the site and manage the project itself, something she said South Australian developers were “very, very disappointed” about. ”The state government doesn’t have a plan for the raw materials that will be needed to do the construction that South Australians need to get their foot in the door of housing,” Ms Lensink said. Source: abc.net.au

Greek Tribune Adelaide, South Australia