City of Melbourne unanimously supports Queen Victoria Market towers

City of Melbourne councillors have voted unanimously in support of the development plan for a $1.7 billion precinct at the southern end of Queen Victoria Market.

Designed by NH Architecture, Kerstin Thompson Architects, 3XN Australia, Searle × Waldron Architecture, Openwork, McGregor Coxall, Lovell Chen and Urbis, Gurrowa Place will comprise three towers, a Market Square, a cultural and civic building, new car parking and the restoration and revitalization of the Franklin Street Stores.

Tower One will be a 125-metre-tall commercial office tower with a stepped design that mimics the approved design for the neighbouring building at 388 Williams Street. Tower two will be a 162-metre-tall residential building with 15 percent of the net floor space allocated to affordable housing. Finally tower three will rise to 183 metres and will accommodate student housing.

Addressing a meeting of the City of Melbourne's Future Melbourne Committee, NH Architecture director Nick Bourns said the project is about "bringing the city into the market, rather than [the existing] road system of car parks and roundabouts, all of which are a huge heat island problem."

He also said the proposed Market Square would be "a more respectful use of the land that used to be cemetery" and that the development would be an exemplar of how large developments can integrate parkland with living and working environments.

In supporting the development plan, acting lord mayor Nicholas Reece said it was a "significant step forward on this project."

"It will be one of the biggest [developments in Melbourne's history," he said. "It's been nearly 30 years since we've seen a project of this scale on a single site in Melbourne."

Reece also commented on the "exciting" architectural team working on the project.

"This needs to be world class and with a team like that coming together on the project, I feel very confident that it will be."

Councillor Rohan Leppert said the development plan was "an extraordinary response to a constrained site with really intricate heritage constraints."

He added that the plan had been through five separate sessions of the Office of Victorian Government Architect's design review to ensure that the design strategies and principles for the project would "ensure that what is designed in this place meets the expectations that a design city would have for a very, very high quality outcome."

The City of Melbourne endorsed Lendlease as the preferred development partner for the Queen Victoria Market Southern Precinct in 2023.

In December 2023, Heritage Victoria issued a heritage permit for the development.

The City of Melbourne resolved to advise the Victorian Department of Transport of Planning that it supports the development application. The Minister for Planning will make the final decision on the application.

If approved, the project will be delivered in seven stages, beginning with the basement construction below towers one and two, the restoration and revitalization of Franklin Street stores, followed by the construction of tower three, tower one and tower two in succession, with Market Square and the Queens Corner Building making up the final stages respectively.

Construction is expected to begin in 2024 and with the stages to be completed over the next five years.