A $44 million plan to replace five Mosman houses with a six-storey, 29-unit block is dead. The fight came down to how far a pedestrian must walk to the shops.
The NSW Land and Environment Court dismissed Metis Group’s appeal against Mosman Council. The site is about 2,000 square metres on Awaba Street. More than 100 residents objected. The case ran about 15 months.
NSW low- and mid-rise (LMR) rules let sites within 400 metres of 171 town centres go to six storeys — eight if they include affordable housing. Between 401 and 800 metres the cap is four storeys. That gap can make or break a scheme.
Metis said Awaba Street sat 383 metres from Spit Junction on a route through local streets and across an unsignalised stretch of Ourimbah Road. It filed traffic reports, video of about 250 people crossing each day, and Transport for NSW data showing no crashes there in a decade.
The council said four lanes without lights is not a safe path. Pedestrians would use the lights further along Ourimbah Road — 40 metres extra, 423 metres in all — outside the 400-metre band.
Commissioner Nicola Targett agreed. People would “reasonably and practically” take the safer route. Ourimbah Road is a regional arterial and can carry up to 1,000 vehicles an hour. Without LMR height and floorspace, the design did not comply. The court dismissed the appeal and ordered Metis to pay $15,000 toward the council’s costs.
The LMR policy, from 2024, is meant to help deliver 112,000 homes by 2029 under the National Housing Accord. Metis co-founder Arian Galanis said a judgment call on which footpath is “safest” is a thin basis for buying and funding housing. Professor Nicole Gurran of the University of Sydney said a flat 400-metre circle ignores how people actually move, and that the rush to free sites has created false expectations.
Mosman Council called the result a win for a community that “felt very strongly.” Resident Peter Papilos, one of 105 objectors, said: “As the crow flies, yes, the site is less than 400 metres from Spit Junction. But people are not crows, and they shouldn’t be expected to negotiate streams of traffic with buses and trucks just so a developer is eligible for major increases in building height.”
Source: Sydney Morning Herald, 28 September 2026.