The once-bustling Tramsheds has been taken over by hoardings. Can the precinct sparkle again?

When the redeveloped Tramsheds at Forest Lodge opened in 2016 as a polished European-style food destination, it attracted an A-list of Sydney restaurant talent. Today, most of the big names have departed and an imposing wall of hoarding hides the empty spaces where they previously traded.

An offshoot from the team behind celebrated Surry Hills restaurant Porteno has left the building, along with newer arrivals such as cult hot chicken eatery Belles. Chef Eugenio Maiale’s artisan pasta spin-off Flour Eggs Water and his Palle restaurant closed at Tramsheds late last year, when the chef’s restaurant group collapsed into liquidation.

A number of factors contributed to the restaurant group’s fall, but “it was Tramsheds that killed me”, Maiale says.

“I did everything I could, [but] not enough people were going to the centre,” Maiale says.

The giant Seagrass Boutique Hospitality Group also cited fluctuating foot traffic. Last year, Seagrass sold The Butcher and The Farmer, which opened at Tramsheds eight years ago with chef Jared Ingersoll at the helm. It remains open under new owners.

A current Tramsheds operator, who asked not to be named, says the problem has been its mix of tenancies, with too many dining venues and not enough service retailers to draw locals and complement its supermarket.

Tramsheds centre manager Nadia Bush argues foot traffic is still strong, but concedes dwell time – the metric that helps fill restaurants in shopping centres – has dropped.

“[Property developer] Mirvac’s original idea was more of an upmarket food venue that didn’t really work post-COVID,” Bush says. Property group Revelop acquired Tramsheds from Mirvac in 2022 for about $52 million, with Bush part of the new team who are working on deals to bring in a bakery, pharmacy and a women’s hairdresser.

Incoming food operators will offer more of a “grab and go” component rather than traditional dining, with new sushi and doughnut operators.

“The local shopping centre has changed, so much shopping is online now,” Bush says. “We need to pivot, [adding] more convenience ... make it beautiful and fun.”

Tramsheds isn’t alone, with other Sydney re-developments over the past decade also filled with restaurants. But a saturation of food venues has made hospitality operators more judicious about where they’ll open.

The Tramsheds outlet from Bondi and Double Bay Asian-inspired restaurant China Diner closed in January when its lease ran out. It has sat empty in recent months, locked in time like a museum piece.

China Diner’s co-owner, veteran Sydney restaurateur Kingsley Smith, says after much deliberation they’ll back Bush’s plan and re-open at Tramsheds at the end of May.

“If a development doesn’t offer restaurants a drawcard like water views, it needs to be a community hub, somewhere locals can go and get everything,” Smith says. He’s hopeful that with a reduced skew to restaurants at the precinct, China Diner will be where locals will go to eat, grab takeaway or hold a function.

With a heritage building, change can be slow. But Bush says Tramsheds’ giant wall of hoarding is on the way out. “Within six months it’ll be gone,” she says.