Plans for a major new indoor snow centre at Penrith in New South Wales, 50 kilometres west of Sydney have hit what its promoters describe as “a major setback”.

The $300 million facility, first announced several years ago, is expected to have its planning proposal rejected by councillors when they vote on the project next week.

“Whilst the proposal would bring many economic benefits to Penrith, the report recommends that the Planning Proposal is not supported on the basis that the proposal is not suitable for this particular site,” a report prepared for Councillors states.

The reasoning is that whilst councillors would like to see an indoor snows centre, they don’t want it built in the planned location, as that is intended for more low-rise developments.  Currently the area where it is proposed for has a height-restriction in place of 8.5 metres, when the snow centre would be 54 metres high.

The planned winter sports world would feature a 300-metre indoor ski slope, ice skating rink, ice and rock climbing facilities, altitude training and a 170-room hotel.

Australia has had several indoor snow centres over the past 35 years, most noteworthy Mt TheBarton (above) which was one of the world’s three first indoor snow centres when it opened in the late 1980s.  There was also a snow slope at the Big Banana theme park on the Gold Coast for a while in the early years of this century. There have also been numerous proposals for other centres in Australian cities over the past three decades.