TAMWORTH'S chief planner says aiming for a population of 100,000 people will help secure money for a water supply upgrade.
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While conserving the remaining water in Chaffey Dam is front of mind for many, there has been a litany of comments in recent times about pushing Tamworth's population to 100,000 within the next 25 years.
It comes as the city stares down the barrel of level five emergency restrictions with no drought breaking rain in sight.
The year 2041 has been flagged as a potential deadline to reach the population milestone.
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It is an ambitious target which the council has begun to map out with its "blueprint 100" document.
The blueprint will go out on public exhibition later in the year and while it might seem jarring to be discussing accelerated population growth amid a prolonged drought draining water supplies, planning director Brent McAlister said the blueprint would help.
"We need the money for that raw water solution and that will run into the many hundreds of millions and the blueprint will be extremely helpful in advocating for state and federal government for that money," Mr McAlister told the Leader.
"So blueprint will be a fantastic advocacy document to get the money for our solution.
"Obviously, the funding has got to come from the government largely, but blueprint is just a wonderful tool to get that money."
He said the city would need a larger water supply to cater for a population of 71,000 so there was merit in planning for an even greater city size.
"If we don't do blueprint and we don't chase development and jobs, we will get to 80,000 by 2041 with 1 per cent growth," he said.
"All blueprint 100 is looking at is 2 per cent growth.
"We will have the challenge of a major capital solution for raw water whether blueprint exists or not."
Recently, mayor Col Murray said there were short and long-term priorities for the city's water security.
He was confident investment from the state government would be forthcoming to help improve the city's short-term situation.
He hinted at a solution to stem the amount of water lost down the Peel River following a release from Chaffey Dam earlier this week, and on Friday, the NSW government announced a $3.4 million pipeline from the dam to Dungowan.
It's expected to save the city 17,000ML a year.
According to Water NSW's latest availability report, Chaffey Dam was releasing about 21 megalitres per day.