Port Kembla resident Jess Whittaker, a Greens party member who has been involved with highlighting a number of recent incidences of water pollution happening in Wollongong creeks, said she took a water sample from a drain about six weeks ago near Foreshore Road after noticing "funny looking" water flowing into it.

She sent these to be analysed by University of Western Sydney water scientist Dr Ian Wright, who told her he was stunned by the levels of pollution. Contaminants found included arsenic, lead, copper, zinc and uranium.

"I don't think that we're full, and I think that we can still be welcoming to visitors in our city," she said. "There is an ugly tendency I have heard from some of our residents to want to make the beaches for the exclusive use of locals only and I think we need to be really careful not to fall into that trap. Our beaches are free for anybody to use, including people from Western Sydney. It is very hot if you live in western Sydney, people live there because they can't afford a house near the beach, and they have just as much right to come to the beach and have a swim on a Sunday as anybody else."

She suggested the council should examine its "car dependency" problem, noting there was plenty of space on beaches but that different ways of travelling were needed.

However, residents did in fact have an issue with the project - which saw Wollongong Coal spending six months removing coal stockpiles.

This change came about when Wollongong Greens councillor Cath Blakey asked the council to come up with more formal guidelines after a Woonona neighbourhood dispute in 2019. Cr Blakey said the new guidelines would help ensure there were no similar issues in the future.

"We were fortunate that people out walking along the footpath at Byarong Creek raised the alarm and reported it to council straight away," said Cr Blakey. "All stormwater drains lead to local creeks and eventually the sea. Byarong Creek flows through Figtree into American Creek, then Allans Creek and eventually Tom Thumb Lagoon also known as Port Kembla Harbour. We need to stop pollution from the source to the sea."

The policy excludes pubs and clubs, which will still have to work with police to determine their hours, and will apply only to the city centre within commercial, mixed use and tourist zones.

Greens councillor Mithra Cox, who has long pushed for more activity within the CBD said the policy would help new businesses.

"There has been a reluctance to approve late-night trading hours for any new businesses, so only existing businesses are able to trade past midnight, and for restaurants it's 10pm, which is really early," she said. "That means the concentration of late-night venues at the moment is basically the big pubs that have been around for ever. So the really significant and exciting thing about this policy is that means new players will be more easily able to get a late night trading license, which means there will be more options for people, and most of those newer players are smaller venues."

"It's not our job to determine what type of shops there are, or at what price they are rented ... our job is the public domain," she said. "My grand vision for the mall is that we would have something that would keep people there for a long time and make it a destination in and of itself - the thing I would absolutely love would be a water play park like they have at Darling Harbour. When we have a reason for people to come and people to stay there - especially if kids want to come and parents will stay - it will mean they buy coffee, they do the shopping while they're there and they'll spend money there that they wouldn't otherwise do."

Indeed, about 10 years ago, the council proposed to build a children's water play area in front of the Church on the Mall. However, this design was scrapped after residents chided the council for lack of change room facilities nearby. Others raised concerns over the impact on brides getting married at the church, and the potential for people to slip on the wet ground.