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On some days, out the back of his shop in North Sydney’s Greenwood Plaza, cobbler Joe Panarello jokes he sees more shows than shoes.
“I’m just watching Netflix,” he says.
Panarello’s store, TJ Shoes, occupies what was once considered a prime position at the Mirvac shopping centre, right near the entrance to North Sydney railway station.
But lockdowns and flexible work took away a chunk of his customer base, as did the relaxed dress codes of the post-pandemic office (trainers don’t need to be re-soled).
The new metro line, shifting commuters north to Victoria Cross station, was a further blow.
“Since 2019, I am down 40 per cent in trade. Then the metro opened, and I am probably down another 10 per cent,” Panarello said. He suspects the situation would be worse if a Mister Minit at the other end of the floor was not among the growing list of closures at the centre.
Greenwood Plaza shopping centre, once a bustling thoroughfare with several international chains and a busy food court, has emptied – of both retailers and customers.
Transport for NSW data shows the average number of Opal users tapping on and off at North Sydney railway station has declined by more than half in just 18 months.
Passenger counts from before the metro opened in 2024 showed 50,659 people passed through the station on a typical Tuesday. Later that year, 31,181 were arriving and departing from North Sydney, while 30,735 used the newly opened Victoria Cross.
By this year, the gap had widened to 41,362 at Victoria Cross and 25,017 at North Sydney, data collected between February 17 and March 10 show.
With the decline in foot traffic, only 45 of the 60 shopfronts on Greenwood Plaza’s ground floor are now occupied by trading tenants, of which several are “pop-up” or outlet stores with limited opening hours. Half of what was the upstairs food court is blocked off by hoarding.
Recent exits include three Cotton On Group stores and Peter Alexander. Units previously tenanted by Baker’s Delight, Novo Shoes and L’Occitane, all of which have closed in the past six months, are also still vacant.
When Nick Wennerbom first looked at moving his Timbertime Toys store into the centre’s ground floor seven years ago, he was told it would be too expensive.
“The leasing guy said, ‘don’t even look down here’. Every brand was an international.”
He ended up moving in during the pandemic. Last year, he was offered the vacant shopfront next door, a former Vodafone shop, to sell Christmas decorations.
“It wasn’t, ‘here’s the rent’, it was, ‘so, what could you afford?’.”
He now runs the second unit as a general gift shop, alongside his original store.
Since 2023, five of Greenwood’s vacant shopfronts have been repurposed for non-retail use, including as end-of-trip facilities, a gaming arcade, a co-working space and a seating area styled as a 1950s diner.
While these spaces enjoyed a brief popularity among local high school students, Victoria Cross is much closer to North Sydney Boys and Girls, Wenona, Marist North Shore and Monte Sant’ Angelo Mercy College. (In an unbeatable drawcard for teenagers, it also has a McDonald’s.)
“The cafes here are just surviving on the Shore kids,” said Wennerbom.
With even fewer people at the centre on weekends, North Sydney Mayor Zoe Baker has suggested Mirvac close stores for a rave or silent disco. She said it was “really interesting” that some of the vacated stores had been leased to sustainable shopping pop-ups, including the Swap in the City boutique and Joy of Giving charity toy swap.
“In Denmark, there are malls that are entirely second-hand shopping,” she said. “I don’t think Mirvac will go that far, but they’re certainly tapping into consumer concerns around the circular economy.”
But while Victoria Cross has overtaken North Sydney for patrons, Baker expected plans for more apartment blocks and the appeal of travelling across the bridge rather than beneath the harbour would maintain demand for the train.
“The reality is that both the metro and the heavy rail will be necessary long term,” she said.
“You can see on the metro it’s sardines, everyone’s packed in, and I think there might be a revival of the heavy rail. I think people will rediscover it, particularly as we’re all reminded by the war in Iran that a reliance on fossil fuels is unsustainable.”
Mirvac did not respond to questions about how many retailers had exited Greenwood Plaza.
In a statement, a spokesperson said North Sydney CBD “continues to evolve” following the introduction of the metro.
“We are continuing to advance our planning and repositioning of the centre to better serve both the local community and the surrounding office workers, and look forward to keeping our partners and community updated as these plans progress.”
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