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April 8, 2018

A Rap Over The Knuckles?

Posted by gleneira under Councillor Performance, GE Council Meeting(s), GE Governance, GE Planning, GE Service Performance, GE Transport
[6] Comments 

In an extraordinary VCAT Watch report Councillors have been severely wrapped over the knuckles and by implication, from the unelected bureaucracy. In short, the message appears to be – DON’T VOTE AGAINST WHAT OFFICERS RECOMMEND!

The issue concerns the VCAT permit granted for a 6 storey development in McKinnon Road. We have repeatedly , and over several years, highlighted the fact that councillors consistently lop off a storey or two, plus some apartments from applications and in the end, VCAT always grants the developer exactly what he wants. Our criticism isn’t solely that councillors have been grandstanding to the gallery, or being ‘populist’. It’s that this tactic has never worked and that councillor energies should have been directed at ‘reforming’ the planning scheme. Not continually knocking off a floor or two only to have VCAT grant the permit. The ‘fault’ as always has been with the planning scheme and VCAT itself. Councillors of course ignored this fundamental aspect of their decision making or simply didn’t have the balls, or the will, to initiate major changes in the planning scheme.

Having said all that, in a democracy, which we’re supposed to be living in, councillors have a duty to represent their constituents. It is these 9 men and women who set policy, direction, expenditure, and who are supposed to listen and act in accordance with the majority of residents’ views. It is NOT FOR THE ADMINISTRATION TO determine how councillors should vote. Their role is to provide the information, make recommendations and then leave it to the good sense (hopefully) of councillors.

The officer report represents a new line in the sand, and a public one at that, between councillors and administration. The tone is uncompromising and in fact quite insulting in our view. Here are some examples and our interpretation of the ‘message’ –

The officer recommendation was to approve the development at six storeys, however the Council decision was to delete the upper two storeys

COMMENT – laying the blame!

In reaching the decision the VCAT member was quite critical of Council’s approach in seeking a development of 4 storeys……..The Member agreed with the position of the planning officer and the expert evidence of the application

COMMENT –  to the best of our knowledge, no report has ever contained this unequivocal support for the ‘planning officer’ and the explicit ‘criticism’ of Council – ie councillors!

The best bit however relates to car parking:

The decision places the onus on Council to fulfill its responsibility to undertake the required analysis of car parking requirements based on the planning scheme provisions and not apply a blanket approach in requiring the statutory provision of car parking. 

COMMENT- There’s a wonderful irony here. Council does NOT undertake its own ‘analysis’ of car parking. Most of the time it blithely accepts the developer’s data without blinking an eye. Secondly, the ‘planning scheme provisions’ are there for a purpose aren’t they? So how can we have in the same sentence a reference to the planning scheme and then dismissing its ‘standards’ by stating that a ‘blanket approach’ on the statutary requirements is not on? This is nothing more than another below the belt attack on those few councillors who repeatedly vote for the required number of visitor car parking in permits.

We definitely live in interesting times when the tail continues to wag the dog! Whether our councillors will now have the balls to assert their rightful authority is open to question. They haven’t thus far!

 

April 6, 2018

The (Planning) Rot Continues

Posted by gleneira under Councillor Performance, GE Council Meeting(s), GE Governance, GE Open Space, GE Planning, GE Service Performance, GE Transport
[5] Comments 

The agenda items set down for next Tuesday feature more planning applications that are literally tearing the heart out of Carnegie and Bentleigh in particular. Of concern is council’s continued penchant to waive visitor car parking with the most spurious and illogical arguments – none of which are of course justified in the various reports.

Here is our ‘review’ of the first of these:

7-11 Belsize Avenue, Carnegie

The application is for a four storey apartment block with 36 units and a visitor car parking waiver of 4. The officer report recommends a permit plus the increase of visitor car parking from 3 to 4 spots – that means a shortfall of 3 spaces.

Things to note:

  • Once again the report does not state how many of these 36 apartments are single, double or triple bedrooms.
  • Setbacks are inadequate but council’s new line of argument is now – Even though the setbacks are less than ideal they still allowed for inclusion of canopy trees, provided that appropriate species were utilised. PLUS this little beauty – The extent of basement and proximity to boundaries was not uncommon for developments of this scale. North-east, north-west and south-east corners all allowed for planning of larger canopy trees.
  • Council repeatedly resorts to the terminology of “preferred character”, conveniently forgetting to highlight the fact that there are NO PREFERRED CHARACTER STATEMENTS FOR ANY HOUSING DIVERSITY AREAS. The result of this failure is that we get the nonsense of: Whilst a four storey development may be acceptable in principle, the design must also respond to its context and achieve an acceptable degree of fit with the preferred character of the area dictated by existing and emerging building forms. What total rubbish.!!!!! With no preferred character statement, conflating ‘existing’ with‘emerging building forms’ is completely contradictory and nonsensical. There are 19 properties in this section of Belsize Avenue. One property has 13 units and another fronting Neerim Road is also a 4 storey with plenty of units. Thus the majority of Belsize remains intact at this point in time! The residents of Belsize and other areas are therefore paying the price of inept council planning that goes back decades. Why aren’t there ‘preferred character statements’? Why hasn’t this been highlighted in the recent structure planning?
  • We also get an entirely new argument with this paragraph – Limited consideration has been given to the structure plan or guidelines due to the advanced stage of the application when the structure plan and guidelines were adopted by Council. Importantly in this respect, the height of the development is in line with the future expectation for this area. Given that council has on several occasions used the structure plan arguments at VCAT, we find it interesting that there is now a divergence from this position and, of course, all to the advantage of the developer! The fact that several paragraphs earlier the report states (f)urthermore it is consistent with what has been adopted under the Carnegie Structure Plan. Thus we have two totally contradictory positions – either the draft structure plan is worthy of consideration, or it’s not. Council can’t have it both ways! Also worth pointing out that the application was received by council on the 29/11/2017 – hardly eons ago! And finally, residents have consistently been told that height is not the be all and end all – yet here we have council’s ‘excuses’ concentrating exclusively on height.
  • Why can’t Glen Eira provide a table that itemises every single component of ResCode and the other requirements that clearly show what is compliant and what isn’t. Council has done this for some applications (poorly) so why not for ALL applications? That would avoid officer reports filled with weasel word after weasel word and phrases – ie ‘not have a major impact’ on traffic; “broadly consistent’, ‘not unreasonably’ etc. Would someone like to give their interpretation of ‘reasonable’ and what ‘broadly consistent’ means?

Our conclusion remains that officer reports are anything but ‘objective’. They simply highlight all the reasons as to why a development should get its permit and ignores, or undervalues, the reasons why it shouldn’t. That of course is planning in Glen Eira!

 

March 28, 2018

Is Council Listening & Learning?

Posted by gleneira under Councillor Performance, GE Consultation/Communication, GE Open Space, GE Planning, GE Service Performance, GE Transport
[12] Comments 

The latest VCAT decision features an application for 7 storeys in Hawthorn Road, Caulfield South. Next door to what is currently the Godfrey’s shop front. Both Council and VCAT refused the permit. However, the member’s comments as to why he refused the permit should provide some salutary lessons for our planning department. We can only hope that the lessons from this case and the recent one in McKinnon Road, McKinnon are being analysed fully. This has not been council’s practice. No document that we are aware of has ever looked at VCAT decisions and made recommendations on how to plug the holes in the planning scheme. Even the recent Planning Scheme Review failed to provide any sensible recommendations regarding VCAT decisions. Nothing was truly analysed, dissected, and reported upon. All we got were generalised comments on the respective zones and not a word about individual decisions and how council should respond to such decisions.

Both recent decisions, and particularly this latest Hawthorn Road one, have profound implications for our so-called neighbourhood centres. Council’s current planning scheme includes the ‘policy’ that centres such as Caulfield South, McKinnon, Ormond, East Bentleigh etc. are lower in the hierarchy compared to the Major Activity Centres (Bentleigh, Carnegie, Elsternwick) and therefore should not be exposed to the same intensity of development compared to these major activity centres.

Planning for our neighbourhood centres has basically been non-existent. Yet large swathes of these suburbs are zoned GRZ. For example, over 40% of residentially zoned land in Ormond is zoned GRZ. All council has produced is a document which, in part, is euphemistically labelled ‘Activity Centre Framework’- replete with such jargon as ‘moderate focus’ on development, or ‘major focus’ on housing growth. Apart from the upgrading of South Caulfield and East Bentleigh there is little to differentiate McKinnon from Ormond, Ripponlea from Gardenvale and so forth.

This is vitally important given these two recent VCAT decisions for the simple reason that council CANNOT afford to continue ignoring these centres. Nor can they continue to treat them as identical and assume that the same planning controls (ie a one size fits all approach) will suffice. Both VCAT decisions make it abundantly clear that NO OVERARCHING POLICY WILL BE ENOUGH. That each centre requires its own, individual structure plan and mandatory controls. Thus, until council gets its act together, developers can continue to have a field day.

Council will undoubtedly pat itself on the back for the Hawthorn Road decision. Let’s not get too excited about the efficacy of the current planning controls. For starters the application was incredibly deficient. Five apartments were to be significantly BELOW GROUND LEVEL – suitable for moles and not humans! The following sections in italics are verbatim quotes from the judgement.

Due to the slope of the site, these largely sit below natural ground level……This identifies that the natural ground level sits close to the height of the ground floor ceiling at the rear of the building with a 2.5 metre setback from the rear boundary.

Next, neighbours with tiny back yards at the rear and zoned General Residential (ie 3 storeys) were facing the prospect of a huge wall – well beyond acceptable lengths

we find the most impacted site is 34a Cedar Street. This property has a small rear yard that is roughly 10 metres deep and 5.5 metres wide. It sits centrally to the rear boundary of the review site. As such the outlook from this rear yard will be dominated by a view to whatever is built on the combined four lots that comprise the review site.

From this central point, the view will be of a 17 metre wide building form. Due to the slope in the land, there is a 2.5 metre cut at the rear of the proposed building to accommodate the ground floor. This results in an apparent wall height of 4.5 metres from the adjoining rear yard.

There were plenty of other deficiencies in this application. But the most important aspect of both this decision and the McKinnon Road decision where the developer got his 6 storeys is the clear message that each neighbourhood centre MUST be viewed in isolation – as a unique entity with its own height limits, setbacks, etc. Thus far council has not provided any indication that this is on the cards. Bayside and other councils in the meantime have been able to produce different structure plans for their neighbourhood centres. They have not taken the easy way out and produced a ‘one size fits all’ set of planning controls. Whether council has the expertise, the will, and the foresight to produce similar work remains to be seen. If they don’t, then we can kiss goodbye to our smaller centres. They will each become home to high rise development.

Please note the following comments from this last decision. Nothing could be clearer for council. But are they listening?

In the case before us, much of the council submission is simply that the proposed building is too tall. This argument appears to be predicated on a principle that, as a neighbourhood activity centre, this location should support no more than four or five storeys, because larger ‘urban village’ centres are the locations for more intense buildings.

The council has adopted structure plans for the urban villages in February 2018 and recommend building of up to 8 – 12 storeys in Carnegie and Elsternwick, and 4 – 5 storeys in Bentleigh. Mr English (for council) contended that these structure plans give context to the council’s desire to diminish heights from higher to lower order centres. It contends that therefore the building on this site should be lower. We, however, share the findings of other divisions of the tribunal that:

  1. It is not appropriate to adopt a blanket position that a specific maximum height be attained because of controls introduced in other locations[2].
  1. Little weight should be given to recently approved planning scheme amendments that limit the heights of development in parts of Bentleigh and Carnegie for land outside these centres[3]. We add to this that the council adopted policies for these centres, and Elsternwick in 2018, are not necessarily relevant to consideration of a site in Caulfield South. This is because the design analysis has been undertaken for the specific considerations of those centres, not the area of our consideration.
  1. There is nothing in the planning scheme to indicate that a uniform height is sought for buildings in this centre[4], or any other neighbourhood centre.

While higher order centres have adopted council policies nominating particular heights, it does not necessarily follow that all development in other, lower order centres, must be lower. A more considered urban design assessment is required.

…. an accepted height, (or height restriction) in one centre cannot be simply transferred to another. We say this for the same reasons that we reject the council proposition that building on this site must be proportionally lower than height it has accepted for higher order centres such as Bentleigh and Carnegie. Just because six and seven storeys were approved in one neighbourhood activity centre it does not therefore mean seven storeys is an acceptable height for this site. A specific analysis of the proposed design against its immediate context needs to occur.

Source: http://www6.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/viewdoc/au/cases/vic/VCAT//2018/453.html

 

March 20, 2018

When Is Evidence, ‘Evidence’?

Posted by gleneira under Councillor Performance, GE Consultation/Communication, GE Council Meeting(s), GE Governance, GE Open Space, GE Planning, GE Service Performance, GE Transport
[38] Comments 

Council has consistently claimed that ‘evidence’ is the basis of all their decision making. Two items from tonight’s council meeting focus on this claim. We feature two recordings:

  1. Council’s response to the Mitchell Street residents’ letter, and
  2. A public question on the Elsternwick structure plan in the ‘community consultation’ phase of the meeting.

We urge all readers to listen carefully and to decide how well these councillors addressed what was being sought and asked.

MITCHELL STREET

  • Does Hyams’ motion change a single thing?
  • If parking/traffic changes are suggested then one should assume that officers did the necessary research to begin with and that their ‘evidence’ for the proposed changes are beyond question. Thus saying “’if this motion gets passed our traffic officers will examine the street and see what they can do there’ implies two things – (1) either no real ‘investigation’ was done PRIOR to changes being suggested, or (2) placating residents with vague, airy-fairy promises
  • Why can’t the results of this further investigation be tabled at council? What are the chances that the residents’ stated concerns will be taken on board?

ELSTERNWICK STRUCTURE PLAN

  • Has any councillor satisfactorily answered the allegation that decision making is ‘anecdotal’ and far from ‘evidence based’. We remind readers that Delahunty called the published shadow drawings as ‘rudimentary’!!!!!! Hardly the basis for informed decision making!!!!!
  • Not one single councillor, nor any published document has as yet presented any ‘evidence’ as to why 12 storeys is necessary.

The Glen Eira version of ‘evidence’ is let’s make it up as we go along to support the conclusions we arrived at from the beginning!

 

 

March 16, 2018

Parking, Planning & Lack Of ‘Evidence’

Posted by gleneira under Councillor Performance, GE Council Meeting(s), GE Governance, GE Planning, GE Service Performance, GE Transport
[17] Comments 

The following letter features in the agenda papers for Tuesday night:

Of concern is the recommendation – once again to merely ‘receive’ and ‘note’ the letter, which will then disappear into the ether no doubt and not be heard of again. Council is duty bound to do far more. Residents are entitled to be provided with solid ‘evidence’ for the proposed changes. For example: has there been a traffic count taken in the past few years? If so, when was this done and what are the results? If in the past there was the decision to erect a ‘no standing zone’ outside 86-90 Mitchell Street, what was the reason and what is the reason now for proposing to change this? And the $64 dollar question of course is that council’s policy is to conduct surveys of local residents before the implementation of changes. Will these 40 residents now be listened to?

The crucial question is- will council now turn all our local streets into parking areas given its statement in the Transport Strategy that they will explor(e) the reinstatement of lost street parking where required. And if council is determined to introduce parking overlays that reduce even further the ‘standards’ set out in Clause 52.06, then should residents expect more and more parking overflow from the commercial centres into their streets?

We urge all readers to take careful note of the following from the Integrated Transport Strategy.

This makes it absolutely clear that council’s intention is to:

  • Reduce the required parking provisions for ‘office space’.
  • ‘Site specific conditions’ can only mean more ad-hoc decision making – especially for restaurants
  • ‘maximise the use of existing (car parking) spaces’, can only augur more of the Mitchell Street example
  • ‘Shared parking’ translates into less car parking spaces provided by developers and residents parking in multi-level car parks largely paid for by ratepayers.

Finally, the Mitchell Street example is the perfect illustration of council’s disastrous planning. Next to a heritage area, and within a flooding zone, Mitchell and its surrounding streets were zoned RGZ in 2013 – ie 4 storeys. Now 5 years later, council is attempting to undo the damage it has created. Too late we say!!!!!! The draft structure plan now wants the WESTERN side of Mitchell street reduced to 2 storey height limit (ie NRZ) and six properties on the EASTERN side of Mitchell Street, reduced to 3 storeys (ie GRZ).  But given what has already happened, and what will still happen until council achieves the gazetting of its amendments, this is literally pie in the sky planning. The horse has already bolted. Yet council has known this for years and nothing was done!

Here is the current state of affairs in Mitchell and Robert Streets. The yellow markings indicate developments granted permits.

The tally thus far is –

77 Mitchell – 3 storey, 7 units

82-84-  4 storey, 23 units

79-83 – 4 storey, 41 units

77 Robert Street, -7 units

Residents of local streets anywhere within cooee of our activity centres have much to fear we forecast!

 

March 13, 2018

Still Outrageous Stats!

Posted by gleneira under Councillor Performance, GE Consultation/Communication, GE Governance, GE Open Space, GE Service Performance, GE Transport
[11] Comments 

The ABS has today released its building approval figures for local areas. The data depicts approvals from July 1st, 2017 to the end of January 2018 – a period of 7 months. We’ve uploaded the full file HERE and present a screen dump for Glen Eira below. Unfortunately some suburbs are linked together (ie Bentleigh/McKinnon). However what these stats reveal is that development in Glen Eira is still way ahead of council’s predictions, raising the same old perennial questions –

  • Why do we need to double the size of our activity centres?
  • Why do we need to rezone areas to accommodate more dog boxes?
  • Why is council failing to respond to these essential questions?

 

March 11, 2018

What The Developers Think!

Posted by gleneira under Councillor Performance, GE Consultation/Communication, GE Council Meeting(s), GE Governance, GE Open Space, GE Planning, GE Service Performance, GE Transport
[9] Comments 

‘Community’ responses to the Urban Design Guidelines have made a belated appearance on council’s website. Several factors are evident:

  • The overwhelming majority of submissions come from developers/planners representing clients. Some submissions would appear to be duplicated – mainly from the earlier submission(s)
  • These submissions invariably argue for less ‘prescriptive’ guidelines including no mandatory height provisions and the ability to go beyond 12 storeys in some cases. Only 2 specifically mention the originally suggested 6 metre setback that has now been reduced to 5 metres.
  • Resident views highlight the length of the document (167 pages) and how inaccessible it is to those without any planning knowledge.
  • Both developers and residents abhor the lack of definition, analysis, and the clear lack of quantifiable, strategic justification.

We thought it worthwhile in this post to focus on how developers view the guidelines as a planning document and what they basically think of council’s performance in this endeavour. Surprisingly perhaps, we feel that many residents would agree with the concerns raised – if not the conclusions (ie pro-development & less constraints). The following extracts reveal once again the shoddy, knee-jerk planning that is the hallmark of Glen Eira Council – and this comes not from residents but from the development industry. Yet this document was passed by councillors with very little change from the first version and once again basically ignoring community concerns. Nor did any councillor, claiming that they had read the submissions, bother to address ANY OF THE CONCERNS listed below!

Here is what developers think:

It is our submission that a definition of Strategic and Urban renewal Areas should be included in the QDG (Quality Design Guidelines). It is also requested that the information listed under Preferred Locations throughout the QDG be clarified, since it often overlays and/or is unclear.

Under Shared Side Boundaries development for Shop Top in commercial Strips areas the QDG states that when  abutting a heritage residential precinct or building, all upper levels must be recessive when viewed from nearby heritage street scapes. This is a vague and unhelpful statement, which does not explain what constitutes recessive, or from where within a heritage streetscape a view should be cast.

The Guidelines should be prepared to be read as a standalone document, yet key information required by readers is not provided. There is a lack of clarity around the identification of a site’s location.

We do not believe the process for community benefit has been appropriately defined nor strategically justified in the documentation provided. Such a proposal is in our view inappropriate and inequitable, particularly in the context where increased density will deliver on metropolitan policy objectives. The idea that scale can be agreed subject to community benefits (“cash for height”) does not represent orderly and proper planning. The processes of negotiation with Council has not been explained. It is our view that surety around this concept is required before it is adopted as part of the Quality Design Guidelines and certainly before it is sought to form part of the Planning Scheme. In our view, a more appropriate process is the use of a Development Contribution Plan Overlay rather than a piecemeal negotiated approach where only some developments contribute to the required community facilities and services.

The prioritisation of commercial land uses in strategic/urban renewal sites requires more consideration. The documentation does not provide any justification for this. The commercial viability and/or economic impact of introduction of so much retail and commercial space into mixed use precincts (if all developments are to utilise the lower three floors for non-residential uses) does not appear to have been assessed. To make the guideline meaningful, such a proposition may be justified if Glen Eira has an acute shortage of commercial or retail floorspace and an assessment exists (by suburb) to demonstrate this.

The guidelines identify “no additional overshadowing of identified key public open space” and yet do not provide the reader any indication of what the key public spaces being referenced are. Other sections also call up access to ‘winter sun’ but again no parameters are provided as to the key hours.

Clearly, additional work to the document is required in order to clarify how preferred building types will be applied and ensure that the guidelines can be read as a standalone document.

The seventh principle relating to the notion of ‘community benefit’ is subjective and does not provide quantifiable guidance to assess a ‘community benefit’….In our previous submission we strongly suggested that future Quality Design Guidelines include quantifiable criteria as to what defines ‘community benefit’. Such criteria would minimise uncertainty surrounding this principle.

We note that the preferred building typologies are not responsive to the actual context of each neighbourhood centre, nor do they permit site and context-responsive design. The preferred building typologies will introduce conflict with the design principle of the QDP which offer a greater degree of flexibility for great design, and provides a more performance based framework to assess design.

The guidelines do not provide any methodology as to how the Strategic Site typology would be identified through the municipality…..We suggest that a precinct analysis is undertaken for all neighbourhood activity centres and transport corridors to determine the locations of strategic sites and precinct specific requirements.

We suggest that upper level setback be considered at a precinct level. This is to ensure the existing character and role of precincts is considered in full

policy change. Overall, the challenge in this policy is that a proper review of the neighbourhood character has not taken place to accommodate the recent variation by the State Government. The review seems to rely on the existing character study, which could be outdated. Additionally, basic considerations  as the average lot size, lot depths and frontages should be properly reviewed to inform such a substantial

The guidelines are highly arbitrary and the level of rigour/technical justification behind many of the guidelines is not clear.

CONCLUSION

What is evident from these comments is that council simply has not done the strategic work necessary to justify any of the proposals contained in the document – including the proposals in the various structure plans. As with the introduction of the zones, what we have is another ‘one size fits all’ approach coupled with meaningless waffle.

 

March 10, 2018

Hansard: Southwick

Posted by gleneira under Councillor Performance, GE Consultation/Communication, GE Council Meeting(s), GE Governance, GE Open Space, GE Planning, GE Service Performance, GE Transport
[5] Comments 

Mr SOUTHWICK (Caulfield)

My question is to the Minister for Planning. Minister, many residents in Elsternwick have expressed concern over the impact of overdevelopment on their local amenity and liveability. The Elsternwick structure plan projects a 20 per cent increase in population and responds to the expectation in your government’s Plan Melbourne  Refresh that will require 22000 residents to be accommodated in Glen Eira in the next 15 years.

The plan, which has been approved by the council, will now go to a planning panel and ultimately you as the minister will be responsible for any changes in the Elsternwick precinct. As the structure plan outlines no measures to cope with this densification and will lead to the loss of established houses in the area, Minister, what is the government doing and what are you doing  to prevent local families losing their homes and to protect the liveability of Elsternwick and the surrounds?

 

March 5, 2018

Time To Act!!!!!

Posted by gleneira under Councillor Performance, GE Consultation/Communication, GE Governance, GE Open Space, GE Planning, GE Service Performance, GE Transport
[17] Comments 

With an election around the corner, it is the opportune time for residents to gain the most leverage. It is also time to bypass council completely and head straight to those who have the ultimate power to make decisions.

We have sent off several versions of this letter (below) to all sides of the political spectrum. It is clear that council cannot be trusted to work in the best interests of its residents. We therefore urge all concerned residents to join us and lobby local and state politicians to ensure that council’s plans for the 12 storey interim controls are thwarted.

CLICK TO ENLARGE

 

March 4, 2018

Bentleigh Car Parking: More ‘Dishonesty”?

Posted by gleneira under Councillor Performance, GE Consultation/Communication, GE Council Meeting(s), GE Governance, GE Open Space, GE Planning, GE Service Performance, GE Transport
[5] Comments 

Council is gearing up to erect at least 5 multi-level car parks throughout Glen Eira – with the possibility of more. Bentleigh alone is to cop 2 according to the recent response to a public question. Yet, the published draft structure plan only admits to ONE multi level car park. We therefore have the ridiculous situation where a response to a public question can state:

The structure plan proposes to increase the parking throughout the centre by 264 public spaces. To increase the parking numbers Council will need to construct two multi deck car parks. (Page 9 of the minutes) 

Whilst the ‘endorsed’ draft structure plan only focuses on the Horsely Street recommendation: 

Development of a new multi-level car park with provision of retail activity at ground floor. (Page 41 of Structure Plan) 

No mention is made of the possibility of two multi-level car parks! 

 

The table below summarises council’s car parking proposals.

  • How can the Bleazby site suddenly provide an additional 143 spots – unless the intent of course is to erect a multi level car park? Wouldn’t it be lovely if for once council was honest and informed residents clearly and precisely what it had in mind!

Thus we have to ask:

  • Is council deliberately obfuscating and hiding its intentions?
  • How much will all this cost and when will it be completed?
  • How much public land will be flogged off to developers or leased to them?
  • What Parking Precinct amendments will be introduced and will the levy be miniscule?
  • Can you really cram 480 car parking spots into 3 levels or will this end up being more like 5 or 6 levels?
 

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