The darling of Sydney's new jewel

The proposed Sydney International Convention, Exhibition & Entertainment Precinct / Pic: Darling Harbour Live Source: The Daily Telegraph

THIS is the first glimpse of a major overhaul of Darling Harbour - with an iceberg-shaped international convention centre, a grass-covered exhibition centre and a new fan-shaped theatre to be finished by 2016.

Today the state government will lodge the blueprint with the Department of Planning, revealing details of the biggest transformation of Darling Harbour in 25 years to bring in boulevards, laneways, new public squares, 1400 apartments at Haymarket, a ballroom and 900-room hotel.

By 2016, it is expected to provide Sydney with the biggest and most advanced conference, meeting and exhibition space in the country, and a world class theatre.

The masterplan also reveals a redesign which aims to open the harbour to the city, moving the light rail and creating a new eucalypt-shaded 680m path called The Boulevard to draw people through the 20ha from the harbour edge to the south of the city.

The exhibition centre will be terraced for more open space and a new theatre, with room for 8000 people, will be slightly smaller but suitable for conferences, basketball games and concerts.

It will create a new Chinese Garden Square, as well as a Haymarket Square and expand Tumbalong Park by 3000sqm to 11,000sqm.

Hassell architect Ken Maher said he wanted the buildings to be "memorable" and with a "degree of variety" between the designs.

He said the new international convention centre had a mirrored surface, to reflect the fountain below as well as the harbour.

Infrastructure NSW project director Tim Parker said, aside from Vancouver, the Sydney exhibition centre was the only one in the world on the waterfront. "We wanted something that is not just another building in the city," he said.

Mr Maher said new address points would make it easier for people to get to Darling Harbour. "Darling Harbour is quite inaccessible at the moment," he said.

Under the schedule, the existing entertainment centre would remain open until 2015. Construction is expected to take three years.

"We are confident they can get it up and ready in three years," Mr Parker said.

Deputy premier Andrew Stoner said the development was the most exciting transformation of Darling Harbour in 25 years and would deliver $5 billion to the economy, providing 3700 construction jobs and ongoing employment for 4000.

"It is just 450m away from Central and 700m from Town Hall stations, yet the precinct has always felt as though as it was disconnected from its Haymarket, Ultimo and Pyrmont neighbours," he said.

"The masterplan creates strong pedestrian links with the north-south boulevard and five new east-west pedestrian connections through the precinct.

"It aligns the light rail stops with entrances to the new facilities to improve pedestrian flow."

A stakeholder briefing yesterday heard the inner west extension of the light rail meant the frequency of services would increase, with a tram stop at the front door of the theatre.

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PM's $1b road war in Sydney's west

Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard at University of Western Sydney Parramatta Campus, beginning her week long visit of Western Sydney. Source: The Courier-Mail

JULIA Gillard has offered a $1 billion-plus down-payment to start building the western Sydney motorway network, claiming it was now a priority for the national economy.

But the money comes with three conditions - the existing M4 motorway must remain toll-free, it must include a freight link to Port Botany to remove trucks from suburban Sydney roads and provide a CBD tunnel link to connect the west to the city.

Ms Gillard told The Daily Telegraph the federal government was now ready to commit funds to the state government's $13 billion WestConnex project.

After a decade of bickering over the most vital piece of infrastructure to relieve Sydney's urban congestion and increase national productivity, Ms Gillard has for the first time committed to delivering a funding package in the order of "billions, not millions".

"This is a big project, obviously the federal government would be prepared to make a contribution. That contribution would have billion associated with it, not million associated with it," she said.

"I think if you were going to use a sentence that had the word billion in it, that would be the right sentence.

"We need to see the details, there is no point coming tomorrow with a line with a little squiggle on it. But if it could be done tomorrow, I would happily do it tomorrow."

The WestConnex has now become the political battleground for Sydney's west, but neither side can definitively say how they will pay for it.

However, provisions for Commonwealth funding for the WestConnex are expected to also be made in the next multi-billion national infrastructure program, to begin in 2014-2015.

"Nothing about this current plan gets freight to where it needs to go and that is the port," Ms Gillard said.

"The estimates are that, of the new jobs created in the coming years, one out of every three of them will be created along the corridors this WestConnex services.

"No.2 is we want a plan that gets people to the city. There is nothing in this plan that gets you, if you are a city worker, to where you need to go.

"The third condition is the people who currently travel on the M4 currently don't pay tolls to do that. We would not want to see the current road to be subject to tolls again."

Ms Gillard said the project was now of national significance, in getting freight from western Sydney to Port Botany, as well as one of easing the burden on western Sydney motorists.

"What we want to see is a plan that meets those three conditions and what the total cost of the project, people say it's $12-$13 billion, will be.

"There is no clear cost, no finalised routes, no clear planning, no start date, no schedule of works. We want to see all that done."

Opposition Leader Tony Abbott has promised $1.5 billion for the project, a pledge funded by diverting half of the Epping to Parramatta rail money. He has backed away from insisting on city and port links.

Ms Gillard hinted that the $2.1 billion already committed by her government to the proposed Epping to Parramatta rail line could be made available, with little hope of the project ever being built under an O'Farrell government

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