A city building its future - investment on the rise

Published on 05 July 2024

The City of Launceston has approved $372m worth of development in the 2023/24 financial year, up $57m on the year prior.

Acting Mayor Hugh McKenzie said the figures showed continuing investor confidence in the Launceston municipality. "

It's pleasing to see continuing strong investment in the Launceston municipality across a range of sectors, including both residential and commercial developments," Cr McKenzie said.

"These figures demonstrate that the City of Launceston is open for business and is a 'can do' Council when it comes to the approval of sensible, sustainable development."

Figures released by the City of Launceston this week showed the Council approved 535 planning applications worth a combined $372m in the 2023/24 financial year, compared with $315m across 635 applications the year prior.

City of Launceston planning approvals:

2023/24 — $372m across 535 applications

2022-23 — $315m across 635 applications

2021-22 — $235m across 672 applications

2020-21 — $383m across 771 applications

2019-20 — $215m across 673 applications

Cr McKenzie said while the total number of applications received by the Council was down, there had been an increase in the number of high value development projects across the municipality.

These included projects from the University of Tasmania, hotel developers, the Launceston General Hospital and TasWater.

"This has been a very positive outcome for Launceston in terms of job creating investment in our municipality, and is one of the strongest results we've seen in the past five years in terms of monetary investment," Cr McKenzie said.

"The development projects the City of Launceston has approved over the course of the last financial year will continue to have a positive impact in our city economically, socially and culturally for many years to come."