Bathurst RSL announced in December 2020 that it was working with a development consortium and also in talks with Bathurst Regional Council to build a 9000 square metre integrated medical services facility, including a private hospital, on the old Clancy Motors site in Howick Street.

The plans include constructing a multi-storey car park behind the RSL club, which general manager Peter Sargent last week said is intended to provide free parking.

READ MORE: Who will build a multi-storey car park first? Bathurst or Orange?

Several months after the announcement, Mr Sargent says "there is a fair bit of detail to work through", but good progress has been made on the DA.

"I would be hoping that we're in a position to provide more information in the next couple of weeks, but right now we're still working through how it's all going to work," he said.

"The DA is being developed by the development consortium, which is Bathurst Integrated Medical Centre, so hopefully there will be more information coming out in the next couple of weeks."

Should the eventual DA be approved, this will be a landmark development for the Bathurst central business district.

It will help to address two big issues in Bathurst by improving parking and luring more specialist medical professionals to Bathurst.

"The intention is that if we can all work together on this effectively - being the developer, council and the club - we could develop something that provides a significant benefit for the whole community, not just in terms of parking, but also in terms of the medical services that are going to be provided in this integrated medical centre," Mr Sargent said.

"This proposal, I think, is a gift horse for Bathurst. It's a gift, potentially.

"There are currently more than 70 empty shops in Bathurst. That's not just because of parking, but because the Bathurst CBD can't survive on retail and hospitality alone; there needs to be other things injected into the mix, other economic stimulus, to make the CBD viable going forward.

"If we can get the parking and all of those things to come together, the CBD will thrive."

READ MORE: New hospital expected to lure specialists, keep patients in Bathurst

The development consortium working on this project includes people who were involved with Orange's new Bloomfield Medical Centre.

Mr Sargent said that all parties involved are committed to making the Bathurst plans a reality.

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