First look: Shop-top apartments planned for Neutral Bay village
Neutral Bay's busy intersection of Military Road and Wycombe Road is set to see a new shop top apartment project.
A company associated with Jim Simons, the director of project management firm Eastview, has submitted plans for the six-storey shop top development, designed to fit into the North Shore Future Directions Policy, which seeks to activate the Neutral Bay Town Centre with increased pedestrianisation, retail, and commercial offerings.
Just 21 apartments will be on offer across the $24.5 million project, which will have two retail tenancies on the ground level.
Design practice EM BE CE have handled the plans for the development, which will be made up of 15 two-bedroom apartments, four of which will have a study, and six three-bedroom apartments, two of them being large penthouses.
Three levels of basement parking will include 25 car spaces for residents, as well as four motorbike spaces and bicycle parking within the resident’s storage area.
The existing streetscape character is a mixture of two storey shop-top retail, with larger four and five-level apartment buildings.
"Designed to respect the surrounding streetscape, the proposed development will match the existing street walls, with bricks utilised throughout the three-storey podium," the Design Verification Statement by EM BE CE read.
"Above the podium, the top two levels are setback from the street, minimising solar impacts, and reducing the visual bulk and scale, while the upper levels utilise a lightweight metal materiality, contrasting the heavy masonry base, and allowing the top floor to be more visually recessive
EM BE CE noted that due to the site’s positioning along a high-traffic road, with a high-level of vehicle noise, apartments have been designed with enclosed winter gardens, which allow residents to enjoy the north-facing aspect, while being sheltered from the street.
"The number of dual aspect apartments are optimised whilst maximising significant views to the harbour, while planters help to soften the space," the design studio noted.
The majority of apartments also include a study nook or study room, to provide residents a place to use when working from home, something especially important in a post-COVID workforce.
Residents will have access to a communal parcel drop-off room, which includes a cold room section, while the nearby Mary Gibbs Plaza and accompanying park will provide a local connection to green open space within the development, with a number of larger public green spaces within a 10-minute walk, including Forsyth Park and Ibery Reserve.
