WHY

Who else feels like Barbara below, and asks themselves Why?

WHY should the community have to fight its own Council, to uphold building controls to restrict overdevelopment, to protect community amenity, to protect property values, liveability, and fundamental rights to privacy, sunlight and pleasant surrounds when it pays such handsome salaries to Manningham planners and elects the councillors to ensure this happens?

WHY are Manningham officers, the authors of the strategy and the determining authority with all the discretionary options, continuing to approve overdevelopments against the very wishes of their employers, the Manningham rate payers?

WHY are the latest open ended guidelines below, now proposed to the panel for consideration, still distinguishing between land areas above or below 1800m2, or indeed between maximum heights of 9 or 11 meters, when either are currently being allowed three and even four storeys in sub precinct A?

“Sub- Precinct A is an area where two storey units (9metres) and three storey (11metres) “apartment style developments are encouraged. Three storey, contemporary developments MAY only occur on consolidated sites with a minimum area of *1,800sqm. The area of 1,800 must all be in the same sub-precinct. In this sub-precinct, if a lot has an area less than 1800sqm, a multi-unit development proposal CAN still be considered, but the development SHOULD be a maximum of two storeys and have a maximum site coverage of 60%”…

WHY the use of such vague words as SHOULD, MAY and CAN in the above guidelines, made all the more bewildering when used in conjunction with such definitive words as “maximum and minimum”.

WHY has Manningham Council allowed developers to circumvent its own regulations by granting permits to overdevelop lots as small as 1,060m2 and 997m2 to facilitate three storeys and the employment of flat lean to roofs?

WHY are Council officers allowing proposals to circumvent the guidelines and gain an addition storey by allowing excessive excavation to lower the ground floor entirely below the natural ground level.

WHY has Council contravened its own previous undertaking to limit developments to two storeys on land less than 1800m2 that would have enabled a development to follow the existing neighbourhood character i.e. pitched tiled roofs similar to two storey established dwellings, villa unit and two storey town house clusters that now dominate our City?

Barbara C

 

 

1 Comment

  1. Harold B. says:

    I could not agree more with Barbara’s comments. The latest DDO8 guidelines, are no less ambiguous than those first published eight years ago. The lack of community support and the inability of our highly paid planners to get it right is reflected in the constant changing from one variation of the formula to another, so much so, that they have again called in a government panel to sort out the mess. Below are three of several different development guidelines published over the period.

    Back in 2005 they said;
    “Sub-precinct A is an area where two storey units and three storey ‘apartment style’ development are encouraged. Three storey, contemporary developments may only occur on consolidated sites with a minimum area of 1.800m2 If a lot has an area less than 1.800m2, a multi-unit development proposal can still be considered, but development should be a maximum of two storeys and have a maximum site coverage of 60%.”

    Then in 2007 there was no mention of what was to occur on smaller sites;
    Sub-precinct A is an area where two storey buildings and three storey buildings, including ‘apartment style’ developments are encouraged. Three storey, contemporary developments are encouraged on consolidated sites with a minimum area of 1,800m2.

    Now in 2013 they propose;
    “Sub- Precinct A is an area where two storey units (9metres) and three storey (11metres) “apartment style developments are encouraged. Three storey, contemporary developments MAY only occur on consolidated sites with a minimum area of *1,800sqm. In this sub-precinct, if a lot has an area less than 1800sqm, a multi-unit development proposal CAN still be considered, but the development SHOULD be a MAXIMUM of two storeys and have a MINIMUM site coverage of 60%.

    HAROLD B.

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