Urgent Government Action Needed For K&D Site

The K&D site (former Kemp & Denning hardware store and timber yard located on Melville Street in Hobart) is again up for sale.

It is an entire city block, and its large size makes it a significant development opportunity.

The University of Tasmania (UTAS) purchased the property in 2019 but has since put it up for sale, sparking a public debate about its future use. The site is considered a blank canvas for development due to its size and commercial zoning. As a former hardware store, the building itself is a large, open-plan warehouse. While it has been used temporarily as a basketball facility, its future is uncertain.

Many groups, including the Greens, have advocated for the site to be redeveloped as medium-density housing to address Hobart’s housing crisis, while others are concerned it could become another big-box retail store or car park. The sale of the property is being handled through an Expressions of Interest (EOI) process, with submissions closing soon.

Featured image above courtesy CBRE.

Urgent Government Action Needed for K&D Site 6

Media release – Cassy O’Connor MLC, Greens Member for Hobart, 22 August 2025

Governments Must Step Up to Deliver Housing in Hobart

The former K and D site in Nipaluna/Hobart represents a once-in-a-generation, city-shaping opportunity – but only if Federal and State Governments step up and help UTAS to choose a buyer for the site that delivers for the city. UTAS has put this large site on the market, with Expressions of Interest to close in a week.

We are still in the grip of a housing crisis. There are too few affordable homes and rents continue to climb. The K and D site could be catalytic to bringing more life and more opportunity to the city, delivering desperately needed homes for Tasmanians.

Nipaluna/Hobart desperately needs more medium density housing with public spaces and mixed commercial opportunities at street level, but unless Federal and State governments step up and UTAS recognises its responsibility to be part of the solution, the chance could be lost.

The Federal Government can help by promising to allocate urban renewal funds to the site’s redevelopment. There’s $240 million in urban renewal funds for Macquarie Point just sitting there right now. That’s money which the Rockliff Government seems to be counting towards the stadium. It could be unlocked to transform the K and D site so it can realise its full potential.

Homes Tasmania has already undertaken master planning for the site, but it doesn’t have the available funds just to buy it and develop housing. We encourage the new Minister for Housing and Planning, Kerry Vincent MLC, to work with his federal counterpart and Homes Tasmania on this huge opportunity.

We also need the Minister to work with Hobart City Council to fix any impediments to favouring medium density developments over car parks in the planning scheme.

It is critical for Hobart’s future that UTAS selects the right buyer for the site but, given the enormous challenges getting medium density housing projects out of the ground, government backing is needed.

The Greens believe UTAS also has a responsibility to make sure it carefully chooses a buyer. The last thing Hobart needs is another big box retail development there, or a car yard. That won’t deliver for the city or do anything to ease the housing crisis.

Urgent Government Action Needed for K&D Site 7

Media Alert – YES In My Backyard, 22 August 2025

With just one week to go before EOIs close, it’s essential all levels of government talk to each other and to UTAS about the levers that can be pulled, and where funding can be found, to ensure the opportunity is seized to transform the Melville Street site into a place for people. This is do-able, it just needs political will.

One week out from the close of expressions of Interest for the purchase of the former K&D site YIMBY Hobart, Greens MLC for Hobart Cassy O’Connor and Hobart City Councillor Ryan Posselt, are calling on Federal and State governments to step up and ensure this once-in-a-generation, city-shaping opportunity does not slip by.

The group has developed the Build Homes Here campaign based on two demands:

1) The university undertake to sell the K&D site to a private developer committed to building medium-density housing, or;

2) Hobart City Council and/or the Tasmanian Government purchase the site and ensure it is developed to its full potential.

YIMBY members are deeply concerned that, left to the vagaries of the market, Hobart’s K&D site could wind up as car-parking, a car yard or big-box retail, squandering a generational opportunity to transform the central city.

The University of Tasmania, Federal and Tasmanian Governments and Hobart City Council have a collective responsibility to avoid this outcome and ensure a redevelopment of the site includes affordable housing and public amenity.

YIMBY stands for YES In My Backyard. YIMBYs advocate for more housing where people want to live.

Media Release – YES In My Backyard, 21 August 2025

Failed Hobart apartment project shows housing market is broken; government must step in

YIMBY Hobart says the collapse of the $80 million Macquarie Place apartment development, despite strong sales and full approvals, is a clear sign of mounting market failure in the city’s medium density sector.

“This was a centrally located, well-designed project with strong buyer interest and support from council. If even that can’t get built, we’ve got a serious problem,” said YIMBY Hobart spokesperson Lachlan Rule.

Developers behind the project cited skyrocketing construction costs as the reason for walking away, despite having sold more than a third of apartments off the plan, including multiple penthouses.

YIMBY Hobart says this case highlights the urgent need for governments at every level to take a more active role in delivering housing in the central city.

“Housing delivery can no longer be left entirely to the private market,” said spokesperson Susan Wallace. “Our failure to build medium density over a long period has led us here. Without public support, we’ll keep seeing good projects fall over.”

The group says the first step should be for governments at every level to work together to see the K&D site in the CBD, now up for sale, developed for medium-density housing and public benefit.

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