621 York St
Notes regarding VCAT hearing PLP2011/404 for 621 York St
On Thursday 21st February 2013, a group of residents appeared at VCAT in Ballarat to object to the City of Ballarat’s decision to grant a permit for 26 units at 621 York St.
The objectors grounds were that: first, the number of lots on the site were too many and each lot was too small, which constituted an over development of the site. The other grounds were the lack of access to the Warrenheip Trail, lack of footpaths, the lack of a landscaping plan and a monotonous roofline being out of character for the area.
The VCAT member’s decision instituted a linkage to the Warrenheip trail at the North end of the site. A landscape plan that involves indigenous plantings must be created and the rooflines amended so as to create a more varied roofline and color scheme, more in keeping with the profile of the neighbouring Cecile Court. The number of lots and footpaths remained unchanged. Overall the residents were not left empty handed.
Some lessons can be gained from the experience. Debate at VCAT did consider how much support there was for the objection. In VCAT’s eyes the more neighbours involved the better, particularly immediate neighbours of the development site.
VCAT members are loath to overturn council decisions, which means locals must mount a much stronger argument against a council’s decision to grant a permit than when locals work with council against an over-ambitious developer. The decision for 621 York St fits the harder model in terms of the decision over lot sizes.
A further lesson is that the council representatives, when opposing locals at VCAT, are quite happy to trash any report to council that doesn’t have actual planning scheme status such as the Ballarat Residential Infill Study. One could ask what purpose do the reports have?
Finally, in light of the Bailleau’s government’s massive increase in fees for objections at VCAT, future developments that are not in the public interest will need to be fought out at the council’s Community Conference meeting. If unsatisfactory outcomes occur at that point, the public will need to ensure their ward councillors “call in” the application. This imposition from the Bailleau government has effectively taken away any chance of affordable justice at VCAT being available to concerned parties. Now the issues will need to be fought at the council level with councillors being the front line.
Mr P Gerardi, Ms V Gerardi, Mr J Rootes, Mr B Gow, Mrs D Gow, Mrs D Chester, Mrs J Smith and Mr M Smith – 28 February 2013