Competing yet complementary

Business parks in the vicinity of Parramatta, such as Norwest, Macquarie Park, Rhodes and Sydney Olympic Park, compete with Parramatta in the commercial office market yet are complimentary to the city, according to the Parramatta City Centre Plan, approved by the Minister for Planning, Frank Sartor, in December.

Parramatta "is situating itself as a business service centre for the other centres with the provision of financial and legal services, and potentially culture and entertainment," the document said.

Employment figures confusing

Parramatta City Council's website states employment in the city centre is "approximately 55,000 today" yet a graph, sourced from the Department of Planning, shows the figure in 2007 was 39,000. The document states that at the current growth rate the number of jobs in the city centre “will reach 50,000 by 2011”.

This figure is repeated in the Parramatta City Centre Plan, approved in December by the Minister for Planning. The document says that at the current growth rate, the city centre "will reach 50,000 jobs by 2011". By council’s calculations, the working population of the city centre has already exceeded that figure.

Becton buys properties in the region

Becton Industrial Fund has purchased two properties in Western Sydney for a total of $38.45 million, taking the fund's value to almost $450 million. One property was a distribution centre at, Arndell Park, purpose-built for Electrolux but now leased to a private business. Becton acquired it for $14,95 million on a yield of &.64 per cent. The other property, at Warwick Farm, is leased to Visy was acquired for $23,5 million on a yield of 7.85 per cent.

"We have been actively targeting the Sydney market (which) is now the second largest market for the fund after Melbourne," said Matthew Chun, Becton's head of funds management.

No change in median land value

The median land value in the Parramatta local government area in the period July 2006-July 2007 was $296,000, with no change over the previous period according to the official property estimates from the NSW Valuer General. Land values fell by up to seven per cent in areas such as Holroyd ($254,000), Blacktown ($184,000), Liverpool ($233,000), Campbelltown ($156,000) and Camden ($191,000). Values rose by 16.67 per cent in Penrith ($203,000), 7.95 per cent in Ryde ($475,000), 3.07 per cent in Fairfield ($235,000).
Woollahra overtook Mosman as the most expensive local government area, with its median land value reaching $1.19 million, up 13.3 per cent, compared to Mosman's $1.18 million, up 3.5 per cent.