Mr. Priestley, who commands unanimous respect in the shelter, said it began when a group of women approached him near Martin Place, saying that they no longer felt safe sleeping on the streets of central Sydney. Many had been woken in the middle of the night and assaulted. Several, Mr. Priestley said, had been raped.

“They said, ‘We don’t feel safe on the streets anymore, because we’re waking up to guys trying to sleep with us,’” he said.

Today, the space shelters, feeds and clothes an array of people. Its drop-in system allows visitors to take what they need on any given day. It also regularly sees full-time workers from Sydney’s central business district, such as cleaners and security guards, stop in for a meal. Mr. Priestley said many of these visitors could no longer afford to both eat dinner and keep up with their mortgages.

An April 2017 report from Anglicare, which surveyed 67,000 properties in Australia, found that Sydney did not have a single property that would be affordable to a single person living on government benefits.

Mr. Priestley said the community response to the project had been largely positive, and this week, those who walked by seemed to pay the camp little mind.

“I have a positive opinion on it,” said a silver-haired, paisley-tied man in his 50s, en route to work at the Reserve Bank. “They keep to themselves, really.”