Located just north of Newcastle, Raymond Terrace is a large urban centre, but expansion is severely constrained by land availability and flooding issues. A private developer, Xcel Properties, prepared a scheme for a 'new town' on elevated land to the north of the existing settlement. HCS was asked by the developer to provide advice on the scale and kind of demand in the future for housing, retail/commercial centres, and employment for the new community of some 5,000 households.
In order to gauge demand, HCS employed a technique which estimated the characteristics of a future population based on a detailed examination of a surrogate development area, in this case from elsewhere in the Lower Hunter region. HCS then looked at the existing (and planned) supply of housing, shops and employment in the Lower Hunter, in order to derive a range of development scenarios in response to the scale of future population in North Raymond Terrace.
Based on this analysis, HCS provided economic commentary on likely needs in the areas of housing, shopping and employment to support the planning process.
