They are big plans that have kept the region's architects, accountants and lawyers busy over the years but have done little for the Illawarra's building industry.
Together they provide an interesting picture of what Wollongong's skyline might have been.
Last week, a site earmarked for Wollongong's tallest building changed hands.
The 3520sqm site at 10-18 Regent St was to be home to the approved $80 million 27-storey Regency Towers, a project of developer David Shalala through the company Wollongong Central Towers.
It has now been bought by a consortium of Sydney and Wollongong developers whose intention is to develop the site.
The development application for the Regency Towers has lapsed, but the new owners are in possession of the rights to the project and may lodge a revised, slightly smaller, proposal in coming months.
No-one is holding their breath for 2009.
Not far from the Regency Towers proposal sits the Rawson St car park, where Mr Shalala hoped to build a private hospital with 60 beds and four operating theatres, a 90-bed nursing home and 127 living units for independent seniors.
There were also plans for 96 residential units on another site on Rawson St, with 3500sqm of commercial and retail space, as well as a 155-space public car park.
Both sites have also been sold. The council car park is still a council car park.
The Regency Towers might be the tallest approved building in Wollongong, but five years ago the ambitious Belmorgan, then Wollongong's new kids on the block, revealed plans for two towers, 28 and 30 storeys high, respectively.
It was to be part of the third stage of the Gravity project.
Then there is Frank Vellar's infamous $100 million Quattro development that played a leading role in Wollongong's ICAC scandal.
Approved in colourful circumstances in 2005, it was rejected by Wollongong City Council's administrators in February this year.
Another approved development that has failed to eventuate is a 12-storey residential commercial complex in Corrimal St, on the site of Trevor Jordan Motorcycles.
Illawarra Property Council chair Geoff Jones said a number of factors had contributed to Wollongong's fallen projects - demand not necessarily one of them.
"Wollongong should have 50,000 to 100,000sqm more office space ... sometimes it's just a matter of the right site or a good opportunity being in the wrong hands," he said.
"Some parties acquired sites, gained a DA and never had any intention of going through.
"That sort of market is gone now ... it may have worked in the past - it doesn't work now."
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