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🚦 Childcare’s Growth Corridors Heat Up
Published about 2 months ago • 14 min read
📆 Fri, 29 AUG 2025 | MLB | Cloudy 12°
🌧️ Good morning Success in childcare property demands bold action and the conviction to move when opportunities arise.
But boldness without mastery is folly.
True confidence comes from higher-order skills: assessing opportunity, pricing risk, and reading demand signals accurately.
So: mastery first, then boldness.
That’s how conviction creates real advantage, and avoids ending in tears.
🧭 In Today’s CREW
🏗️ NSW: Garden Suburb Site 🏛️ VIC: VCAT Watch - Mount Waverley 📝 VIC: Town Centre Site In Aintree 🔶 QLD: Sunshine Coast -Draft scheme 🏗️ VIC: Riddells Creek Gets Gumboots 🧭 SA: Gawler + Onkaparinga growth 📊 VIC: ELC Sale- Explorers, Werribee 🌱 WA: East Wanneroo - PSP early read 🆕 New This Week: DAs + SAs + Early ops.
🏗️ Site In Garden Suburb, NSW
Site: 158 Marshall St, Garden Suburb NSW Use: Childcare (R2 zoning supports with consent) Opposite: Garden Suburb Public School
Why it matters: CREW readers often ask — what does a real, investable childcare assessment look like?
Today we’re pulling back the curtain with a live market assessment of a site currently offered for sale.
📊 The Assessment
Catchment Snapshot
Pop 2024: 19,570 (+0.7% p.a. since 2019)
0–5 yrs: 1,349 children
Household income: $116k (above NSW avg)
SEIFA: 6.7 (advantaged)
Supply Balance
Existing LDCs: 5 centres, 333 places
Ratio: 4.05 children per place (vs NSW ~2.8 balance)
Fees: $147–164/day (above state average)
Quality: Mostly “Meeting NQS,” only 1 “Exceeding” (Rumpus Room Charlestown).
Pipeline
Garden Suburb ELC (96 pl, start 2026)
St Nicholas Kotara (79 pl, under construction)
Kotara LDC (96 pl, DA lodged 2025)
Total: ~271 new places → demand ratio eases but remains ~3.0.
🚦 Traffic Lights
🧭 CREW Take
Opportunity: A 90–100 place premium service opposite Garden Suburb Public School.
Edge: New, high-quality facility can differentiate against older stock.
Watchpoint: Traffic/parking at school peak. DA support will need a robust traffic study.
👉 This kind of assessment is delivered to CREW PRO members — 3 times a week.
📊 Each report highlights a verified childcare market gap with data + context, and usually some site options for you to investigate further.
These insights are the foundation for projects we progress inside Optivest Project Partners, where select operators, developers + capital partners collaborate to convert gaps into real centres.
🚀 Start with CREW PRO to access the market intelligence. If you’re the right fit, you’ll hear about Optivest.
The VCAT approval, however, comes with conditions on fencing, landscaping, and traffic access, factors that could materially affect feasibility.
📊 Catchment Comparison – 2km vs 4-Min Drive
293 Blackburn Rd, Mount Waverley | Main Service Area
2 km radius: 35,231 people, 1,331 0–4s, 8 centres/618 places, ratio 2.79 — strong undersupply.
4-min drive (8am peak): 21,376 people, 846 0–4s, 6 centres/454 places, ratio 2.40 — closer to balance.
Insight: The 2km radius inflates demand by ignoring traffic barriers. Drive-time analysis is the more realistic lens.
⚠️ The Topography Problem
The site has a 4.6m fall across it, with raised deck play areas.
On flat sites, a 1.2m permeable fence might tick both planning and licensing boxes.
On sloping decks, that same fence may fail ACECQA containment rules
BCA balustrade standards (≥1m solid, non-climbable barriers) also come into play.
Net result: VCAT’s visual amenity fix collides with child safety and licensing regs. Corner dominance and an overbearing presence was an issue here. Unless carefully resolved, usable outdoor play space shrinks, and capacity could dip ~8–10 places.
🗂️ Regulatory Risk Matrix
🚦 Traffic Access Limitations (VCAT Condition)
Left-in/left-out only on Blackburn Rd.
Montgomery Ave: parent drop-off/visitor parking only; basement reserved for staff.
Effect:
Southbound traffic can flow in/out directly.
Northbound traffic faces extra friction; families must detour or U-turn, so the practical catchment skews southbound. The pool of potential enrolees isn’t halved, but reduced. In childcare, safe, convenient, low-friction access wins.
📉 Traffic Profile (VicRoads, May 2023)
Key insight: Despite 29k–35k vehicles/day, only 15k–18k southbound cars/day are conveniently serviceable under permit rules. That’s still a hefty volume to draw from; though peak-hour flows can get gnarly.
🧾 Next Steps After VCAT
Permit issued with conditions: VCAT granted approval, but required amended plans showing fencing changes, acoustic wall setbacks, landscaping, and tree retention.
Council endorsement: The applicant must lodge amended plans “to the satisfaction of the Responsible Authority”. Council’s role is administrative only; they cannot impose new conditions or re-litigate the case.
If compliant: Council is obliged to endorse the plans.
Timeframes:
Development must commence within 2 years,
Must be completed within 4 years of the Tribunal’s order.
🛑 Fence + Topography Risk
VCAT required fences along Blackburn Rd/Montgomery Ave to be visually lighter, with reduced height and more openness.
In childcare, 1.5m fencing is the benchmark for licensing on flat sites.
On elevated decks or sloping ground, regulators usually require 1.8m+ non-climbable barriers (often transparent acoustic or perspex panels).
Conflict: VCAT’s visual amenity solution (lower, more open fencing) risks failing ACECQA containment standards and BCA balustrade rules on a site with a 4.6m fall.
Impact: If outdoor play areas can’t be fully licensed, effective capacity could drop 5–10 places below the 110 headline.
🧭 What It Means for Feasibility
Nominal approval: 110 places.
Effective capacity: Likely 100–105 places once fencing and play area constraints are factored in.
Market skew: Southbound commuters (towards Monash/Clayton/Chadstone) are the true enrolment base.
Operator reality: Radius analysis looks green; drive-time + traffic rules put this closer to amber.
💡 CREW Takeaway
This case shows why childcare development is as much about conviction and foresight as it is about data.
📊 Catchments tell two stories: A 2km radius looked green, but drive-time and traffic filters showed the real pool. Blackburn Rd is a southbound commuter play, not a full-circle catchment.
⚖️ Conviction and staying power matter: Council refused, VCAT approved. Appeals can cost $50k–$100k+ with no guarantees. You don’t fight unless the market gap is real and the juice is worth the squeeze.
📉 Price in the foreseeable: Feasibility should be stress-tested for knocks; like a loss of 5–10 places from fencing, traffic or outdoor space conditions. Predicting outcomes may feel like chasing a falling leaf, but most risks are foreseeable and can be priced.
👉 The lesson: fight the right fights, with steadfast conviction, and a feasibility robust enough to absorb the hits.
📝 VIC: Site In Aintree
Colliers is marketing 2 Plains Circuit, Aintree (5,385 m²) via Expressions of Interest closing Thursday, 11 September 2025 at 3:00pm AEST.
🌏 Locational Context – Where is Aintree?
Aintree lies 28 km west of Melbourne’s CBD, within the City of Melton.
It sits in Melbourne’s Western Growth Corridor, one of four designated state growth areas earmarked for rapid greenfield expansion.
The site sits within Woodlea, a 711-hectare masterplanned community developed by a joint venture between Mirvac and Victoria Investments & Properties (VIP).
VIP originally secured the site, with Mirvac bringing large-scale delivery expertise.
At maturity, Woodlea will accommodate ~20,000 residents across 6,500+ homes, anchored by a Coles-based Town Centre, schools, health, and community facilities.
Around 30% of land is open space (parks, wetlands, trails).
Connectivity:
Western Freeway (M8) to Melbourne and Ballarat.
Rockbank Station (Sunbury Line, ~30 min V/Line express to CBD).
Planned arterial upgrades to support growth.
Demographic profile: Aintree is family-heavy, with larger-than-average households and a 0–4 population more than double the Victorian average.
Why it matters for childcare: Families in growth corridors like Aintree enrol early, have bigger households, and demand convenient, car-accessible services.
📍 Location Context – The Subject Site
The subject property at 2 Plains Circuit is a 5,385 m² mixed-use island parcel with triple frontage directly adjacent to the Coles-anchored Woodlea Town Centre.
Its size makes it too large for a standalone childcare, but ideal for a childcare-led mixed-use scheme.
Adaptive reuse – Oreana’s Aspire project, recycling the former 2,780 sqm sales hub.
Opportunity: 2 Plains Circuit provides a purpose-built blank canvas. Unlike Oreana’s adaptive reuse, it can support scale, co-location, and strong long-term positioning for both operators and investors.
✅ Traffic Light Assessment
📊 Estimated Additional Supply Required
To restore market balance at 80% target occupancy, the catchment would require ~400–450 additional LDC places today.
Even after pipeline completions, a residual gap remains.
CREW POV
2 Plains Circuit is not just a childcare play.
It’s a chance to deliver Woodlea’s second major family hub.
The numbers support it: strong demand, zero vacancies, high growth, affluent young families.
While Oreana’s Aspire project demonstrates the value of adaptive reuse and convenience-catchment positioning, 2 Plains Circuit offers the scale for a purpose-built, next-generation hub that can differentiate and secure long-term demand. This opportunity is likely to be highly contested by developers, operators, and investors.
Open now → Fri 19 Sep 2025. The proposed scheme replaces 2014 and guides growth through the 2040s. Use Council’s ePlan, site reports and mapping tools.
18 new Local Plans. Coverage extends LGA-wide (urban + rural), replacing 27 legacy areas with clearer, place-specific rules.
Hands-on mapping. Start in the Swipe/My Property tool to compare current vs proposed, then click through to the ePlan for the source of truth.
Heads-up: Some special areas (e.g., Palmview Declared Master Planned Area) won’t show zone/height in the swipe tool—check the ePlan and structure plans directly.
Do the reading. Council’s info sheets explain zones, overlays and local plans—use them when drafting submissions.
🏗️ Where the scheme intersects live ELC opportunities
Palmview (Area B): active DA + reserved CF sites
What’s lodged: Child Care Centre DA MCU25/0197 at Peter Crosby Way by LCA Palmview Pty Ltd (Living Choice). Public material confirms a 250-place, single-storey proposal on a code-assess track.
Reserved community pads: The current Palmview structure plan identifies three ~0.3 ha Local Community Facility (LCF) sites intended for community uses (childcare, health, civic).
Why now: Palmview sits under a declared master-planned area, so some online viewers won’t display zone/height. Use the ePlan + OPM maps to verify CF lots and lodge any submission points while the scheme is open.
📌 What to do
Validate access, buffers, overlays for the CF pads in the ePlan/structure plan.
Lift parking/traffic/hours/acoustic precedents from MCU25/0197 when scoping CF-site DAs.
Bottom line: Palmview offers a rare trifecta—pre-zoned community land, an active code-track DA proving suitability, and identified CF pads ready for standard 90–120-place centres.
Aura (Caloundra South PDA): demand in market
What’s opened/announced: Goodstart Nirimba (Aura) around 132 places from April 2025, signalling sustained demand in the 4551 catchment.
Housing pipeline: Gagalba (new Aura suburb) approved for ~900 homes, adding pressure for social infrastructure.
📌 What to do
Cross-check EDQ PDA approvals with Council’s proposed centres/overlays so sites align with staged rooftops. (PDAs can sit outside parts of Council’s swipe mapping.)
🔎 Investigate next (quick, verifiable wins)
Palmview CF pads: Confirm parcel IDs and constraints on the OPM map and in the ePlan before you option.
Track MCU25/0197: Monitor final parking/traffic conditions you can mirror.
Aura growth fronts: Sequence sites with Gagalba stages and the Nirimba opening to avoid cannibalisation.
Submission kit: Use Council info sheets to keep community uses straightforward in centres/CF locations. Deadline: Fri 19 Sep 2025.
🛠️ How to work the draft (fast)
Run addresses through My Property → click ePlan for definitive zone/overlay text.
Treat Palmview & PDAs as boundary cases—use structure plan/EDQ docs alongside Council tools.
Calendar it: Submissions close 19 Sep 2025 (AEST). 🗓️
✅ Bottom line
Read the ePlan, map CF/centre controls, and align with live DAs and PDA housing stages.
Palmview and Aura are the clearest, fact-supported opportunities on the Coast right now.
With a 2025 population of 4,065 within the Main Service Area, Riddells Creek is set for a population uplift of ~3,800 under the new Amess Road PSP.
While outside Melbourne’s Urban Growth Boundary (part of Macedon Ranges Shire, not metropolitan Melbourne), the township functions as a commuter belt with strong ties to Sunbury and the city.
CREW modelling shows that uplift will generate net new demand for at least another 125 LDC places. So the new Gumboots facility will capture both pent-up demand and absorb much of the forecast growth.
For developers: the “first-mover” advantage is effectively gone. Gumboots is already positioned to dominate.
For operators/investors: any follow-on project must be highly selective, likely waiting for second-wave demand once population growth materialises and stabilises.
CREW POV
Gumboots has played this strategically: early entry, premium offer, aligned with commuter/professional family demographics in a peri-urban location.
The regional-township character of Riddells Creek means growth will be lumpy and infrastructure-driven, making first-mover positioning even more critical.
Risk: oversupply if others follow too soon, as the catchment can only sustain one large centre in the near term.
⚖️ Traffic Light View
Supply/Demand Balance: ⚠️ Tight — one centre absorbs any pent up demand and projected demand uplift.
Operator Positioning: ✅ Strong — premium differentiation in a growth market.
Future Pipeline Risk: ⚠️ High — new entrants following Gumboots would risk oversupply until full PSP build-out.
Bottom line Gumboots has locked in Riddells Creek. And the new Amess Road PSP underpins their success.
🧭 SA Growth Watch: Gawler + Onkaparinga Heights
What’s new
🏘️ Onkaparinga Heights: RFP launched to partner with Renewal SA on ~1,000 homes across 68ha (est. $750m completed value), with 20% affordable housing; adjacent private land flagged for another ~1,000 homes. SA Water works slated to start Q3 2025.
🚑 Gawler/Willaston: New $8m ambulance station on Main North Rd is open — HQ for 28 SAAS staff, two 24/7 crews, bays for up to five ambulances, plus a public AED; replaces the 50-year-old Murray St site and more than doubles capacity.
Why it matters
👶 Population pipeline: 1,000+ dwellings in Adelaide’s south = a fresh LDC catchment forming; first movers near primary schools + daily-needs nodes will be advantaged.
🧭 Service clustering: The Willaston station anchors Gawler/Willaston/Evanston as a growing hub — helpful for parent commute patterns and staffing.
By the numbers
🚑 Ambos: 28 staff · 2× 24/7 crews · up to 5 vehicle bays · public AED.
🏡 Housing: ~1,000 homes · 68ha · 20% affordable · 32 km from CBD · bordered by Main South Rd & Piggott Range Rd · rezoned to Master Planned Neighbourhood in 2023.
CREW take
📍 Scout now: Target Onkaparinga Heights edges along Main South Rd/Piggott Range Rd for LDC, medical, and QSR co-location; lock options before civil works begin.
🔎 North watch: In Gawler/Willaston, revisit DSR + DA pipeline; prioritise infill near arterials where new services (incl. SAAS base) strengthen the employment catchment.
🌱 WA East Wanneroo: PSP early read
📍 Wanneroo WA | 🗓️ Aug 2025 | 🏘️ Zoning uplift approved
The updated plan is now active policy, enabling zoning uplift, accelerated subdivision, and structured developer contributions.
🧠 Why it matters
East Wanneroo has long been earmarked as Perth’s next growth frontier.
Now, with formal adoption of the amendment, development momentum will shift from talk to action.
✅ The amendment:
Updates and rebalances land use zones
Re-designates large areas from R20 to R30
Introduces new Public Open Space (POS) layout
Clears the path for pending subdivision approvals
Provides a formal basis for Development Contribution Plans (DCPs)
🔍 What’s changing
🟩 R30 replaces R20 Large tracts of land previously designated R20 are now R30, increasing development yield and reshaping feasibility assumptions.
👨👩👧 Population density shift Higher residential density in select pockets supports greater catchment consolidation for local services, including long day care.
🏫 Community sites embedded Designated community zones—often the preferred location for child care, allied health, and other social infrastructure—remain central within the revised plan.
🚜 Land supply primed The planning certainty and uplift in density will likely bring forward land sales, DA activity, and pre-leasing movements.
🏁 What’s next
💡 Developers holding land in the precinct (including groups like Wolfdene and Qube) now have an open runway to progress sales, DAs, and service-led placemaking.
👷♂️ Expect applications for neighbourhood-scale childcare centres, local retail, and community uses to follow closely behind subdivision approvals.
📊 VIC: Sold - 24 Scotsburn Grove, Werribee
Price: $7.07m Yield: 5.97% Operator: Explorers Early Learning Upside: ACZ zoning (up to 5 levels) Rent: $422,500 pa (~$3,200/place, below suburban benchmarks) Lease Term: 15 + 10 + 10 years Purchaser: Offshore private investor
2️⃣ 409–411 South Rd, Brighton East — CBRE sale $16.5m | ≈4.9% | Only About Children Zoning allows up to 8 levels, long lease to major operator
⚖️ CREW POV All three sales were brokered by CBRE's Melbourne-based Social Infrastructure team, highlighting their dominance in the premium childcare market.
Brighton assets cleared sub-5% thanks to metro prestige, high land values, and strong operators.
Sub-$5m deals often trade even sharper (up to 50bps tighter) as private buyers drive pricing.
Werribee sat closer to 6% as offshore investors underwrote actual rent and trading risk, not just uplift.
👉 Jimmy Tat, CBRE, told CREW that Scotsburn Grove’s quieter side-street location, ~60% first-year occupancy, lower land values, and local competitive framework shaped the yield outcome.
📈 Even so, the EOI drew 80+ enquiries and four offers — 100% offshore Asian capital — with more than $75m reportedly still seeking quality childcare assets
📊 Approvals, Applications & New Developments
Week ending 29 August 2025
✅🏫 Service Approvals New licences have been granted to Brady Bunch (Mt Duneed, VIC), Story House (Doreen, VIC), Joy Early Learning (Ripley, QLD), and Little Lane (Doncaster, VIC) — adding over 460 places across key metro growth corridors. They join Heritage House North Parramatta, Edge Kanimbla, Inspire Bilpin, Bloom Wellard, Rochedale Central, Children First Berserker, and Curiosity Tree Burpengary.
🏗️ Development Applications Fresh DAs landed in Wollongong, The Hills, Blacktown, Liverpool, Cumberland, Tweed, Hawkesbury, and Ipswich, including a 104-place centre in Corrimal. Activity across NSW, VIC, and QLD highlights developers pushing ahead despite tighter build costs.
🌱 New Developments Pipeline announcements reinforce momentum: The Hive Academy (Warnervale, NSW), Kids On Castletown (WA), GRO Early Learning (Moranbah, QLD – 112 places), and Sacred Heart Preschool & Long Day Care (Matraville, NSW – 60 places).
These early signals often precede formal DAs — a leading indicator for where capital and operators see demand.
💡 Why it matters: Service Approvals confirm real operating capacity, DAs spotlight supply pipeline risks and opportunities, and early-stage announcements show where the next wave of demand is expected to land.
Together, they provide CREW readers with a 360° view of supply movements across the country.
📆 Fri, 3 October 2025 | MLB | Fine 12° Good morning 👋 Morayfield’s Oakey Flat Rd can likely support two ELCs. Sydney just set a childcare price record near $16m at ~4.4%. Supply is rising, demand is steady, and the 2026 three-day guarantee is the wind at our back. In today's edition...🧒🏽 Morayfield: Room for two new ELCs?🏆 Sydney childcare sale sets new Aussie record🍼 New Journey Early Learning: St Albans, VIC📊 Childcare: supply up, demand steady-to-soft 🧸 Childcare deals wrap: September 2025...
📆 Fri, 26 SEPT 2025 | MLB | Showers, Windy 13° Good morning 👋 A regulator steps in at Bright Days Herston as NSW’s pipeline shifts. We’re tracking the outliers, a fresh childcare DA in Yandina, and what Arena’s 2025 signals for community-first investing.In today's edition...🏚 Bright Days, Herston: Enforced Closure✈️ Outliers & Outperformance🏙️ NSW Major Projects🏗️ New DA Lodged: Yandina📊 Insights from a $100B Playbook🏗️ Arena REIT 2025: Annual Results📢 Childcare DA Checklist📈 New DAs and...
📆 Fri, 19 SEPT 2025 | MLB | Showers, Windy 13° 🖐️ Good morningIf you want a plant to grow, you can fuss over it every day; watering, weeding, shifting it toward the sun. Or you can place it in the right soil and let nature do most of the work. A seed planted in the right spot often thrives on its own. Childcare development is no different. You can pour in effort — capital, consultants, marketing — but if the market or site is wrong, it will be a struggle. Put the same energy into picking the...
