Ashwood Chadstone Gateway Project

The Ashwood Chadstone Gateway Project (ACP) is a significant component of the Ashburton/Ashwood/Chadstone Neighbourhood Renewal area.

The project used the resources and ideas of residents, government, business and community groups to tackle disadvantage in areas with concentrations of public housing.

The project involved the redevelopment of six sites owned by the Office of Housing.

AHS was engaged by Port Phillip Housing Association to lead their bid.

In partnership with PPHA AHS developed a successful strategy that addressed the bids objectives, namely:

• To leverage government investment in the provision and enhancement of community housing within the sites
• To maximise the number and quality of community housing units to be developed by PPHA within the sites or alternative sites
• Provide additional units outside the Ashwood sites
• Provide best value-for-money for the Director of Housing and the community. 

The resulting successful bid provided for a total of 283 units with 211 retained for community housing.

Key innovation:

AHS had the skills to quickly understand the bid requirements. In addition AHS, identified other opportunities for innovation.

One such opportunity was to proactively engage with the local community and stakeholders. In response AHS developed a community engagement strategy.

AHS also understood the importance of tangible communty benefits and developed a fraemwork for a longitudinal Social Impact Assessment to objectively measure the success of the development and the outcomes for the community.

The capacity to clearly and quickly understand the requirements of complex bids enabled AHS to put together the necessary resources which ultimately saw PPHA nominated as the successful respondent.