The owner of the successful Cannington shopping centre has made its development a priority as part of a $3 billion expansion push.
Westfield Carousel owner Scentre Group is expected to unveil details of a major expansion of the Cannington shopping centre in coming weeks, with the redevelopment likely to result in the mall reclaiming its title as Western Australia’s biggest.
Scentre Group, which was created through a merger of Westfield Group’s Australian and New Zealand property portfolios, identified Carousel as a priority development opportunity in its half-year results, but the company did not provide any details regarding a construction timeline.
However, a research note released by Morningstar Research last week forecast the expansion to begin before the 2018 financial year.
In Scentre’s half-year results, the group said it was undertaking pre-development activity on $3 billion worth of expansion opportunities, with between $1.5 billion and $2 billion of works expected to kick off over the next three years.
The opportunities covered 15 centres in Australia and NZ, including Carousel and Westfield Whitford City Shopping Centre.
It is expected the Carousel expansion will add at least another 30,000 square metres of net lettable area, which would vault it past Lakeside Joondalup Shopping City to be WA’s largest, with 112,000sqm of retail space.
Scentre Group is understood to be preparing a development application for the first stage of expansion at Carousel.
At Whitfords City, a $192 million proposal to add 12,700sqm to the centre hit a roadblock last year, after the Metropolitan North West development assessment panel said the plan did not meet the requirements of the state government’s activity centres policy.
Lakeside Joondalup will take the top spot on the BNIQ Shopping Centres list once its $300 million expansion, which will take it to 96,000sqm, is completed in December.
However, depending on construction timelines, the looming $750 million redevelopment of Garden City Booragoon to 120,000sqm could derail Scentre’s plans to re-establish Carousel as the state’s largest centre.
The proposed expansion of Carousel is part of the Westfield Carousel Local Development Plan, developed by Scentre Group in collaboration with the City of Canning.
The over-arching plan provides guidelines for the redevelopment of the centre to become an activity centre – encompassing retail, commercial, residential, entertainment and community offerings.
A central civic space, Cecil Square, will become the focal point of a redeveloped Carousel, comprising community pavilions, performance areas, children’s play areas and a fresh food market.
The space is also expected to complement the Canning Agricultural, Horticultural and Recreational Society’s redevelopment of the Cannington greyhounds track.
The redevelopment, which was reported online last month by Business News, will take place at the current greyhound track, which will be shifted to a new facility set to be constructed on an adjacent block.
The society recently signed a lease with Bunnings, which will construct a new Bunnings Warehouse hardware store on a parcel of land on the corner of Albany Highway and Liege Street.
The plans, which will be funded by the Bunnings deal, comprise a multiple-use showground and community facility facing Albany Highway.
Greyhounds WA received $13 million from Racing and Wagering WA last month to construct a new racing facility to facilitate the move.
