Elizabeth Grove — Former Shopping Centre Redevelopment

Background

An education provider engaged Trilogy to assess a vacant former shopping centre site ahead of redevelopment. The site presented several typical brownfield risks, including former commercial uses, surrounding offsite sources, demolition history and visible surface waste.

Trilogy combined desktop review, site inspection and targeted intrusive works to clarify whether soil, vapour or asbestos issues could constrain the proposed education and residential use.

PSI desktop review output — site boundary and key activities of interest including dry cleaner tenancies, suspected motor vehicle workshop, and adjacent service station.

Scope of Works

The assessment was designed to move quickly from broad due diligence to practical development advice. Works included:

• Desktop review of site history, surrounding land uses and regulatory records
• Site walkover and targeted inspection for surface asbestos and waste materials
• Soil and soil vapour investigation across key risk areas
• Laboratory testing for the main contamination risks relevant to the proposed use
• Clear recommendations for any further management or remediation works

Push tube drilling rig advancing soil bores across the open site — the former shopping centre footprint is visible as cleared ground in the background.

Representative soil core showing the natural red-brown sandy clay profile encountered below shallow fill — uniform, uncontaminated material throughout.

Findings

Soil and vapour. The targeted investigation did not identify significant soil or vapour impacts that would prevent the proposed redevelopment. Potential offsite vapour sources were assessed and did not present a material intrusion pathway to the site.

Asbestos. Bonded asbestos fragments were identified at the surface in several areas. This became the key residual management issue, with vegetation and hardstand limiting full delineation at the initial investigation stage.

The investigation narrowed the site risk profile from multiple possible contamination sources to a manageable asbestos clearance and validation pathway.

Bonded asbestos fragment (with pen for scale) identified at the surface within the former shopping centre footprint during the systematic walkover transects.

Helium integrity test on a soil vapour bore prior to Summa™ canister sampling — confirming no preferential pathway between surface and screened interval.

Outcomes

The work gave the development team a clearer risk position before progressing design and approvals. Soil and vapour risks were materially reduced, while the remaining asbestos issue was translated into a practical scope for clearance, removal and validation.

• Key soil and vapour pathways assessed and not identified as major constraints
• Surface asbestos risk mapped and converted into a manageable remediation scope
• Development team provided with clear next steps for approvals and construction planning