Parking is without doubt a central concern for Glen Eira residents. Council’s ‘solution’ has been to either waive parking requirements (especially for commercial uses) or refuse residential parking permits forcing car owners to park their vehicles in surrounding local streets.

Despite the Planning Scheme stating that Parking Precinct Plans will be devised, and that Public Acquisition Overlays will be introduced to provide public parking Council has done absolutely nothing on these matters. They have not purchased land and converted this into public car parks – rather they have ceded space in Centre Road in exchange for a yet to be built public toilet! Nor has council done anything in terms of introducing Parking Overlays that really address the issues.

Glen Eira has basically two Parking Overlays within its planning scheme:

• One for the Caulfield Village Development, and
• One for student housing in several areas throughout the municipality

We note that the Caulfield Village overlay has no visitor carparking in its mandate and the student housing overlays stick to the minimum allowable.

WHAT CAN BE DONE

At last council meeting Hyams claimed that Council is powerless to change ResCode parking standards. Not so! Council has the power to introduce schedules to any Parking Overlay that outstrips ResCode. (Clause 56.02-5). This would operate in the same manner as schedules to the residential zones. Basically, councils have been given the right to determine what parking provisions go where in their municipalities. Glen Eira has chosen to do bugger all in stark contrast to what countless other councils have achieved.

What is even more galling is that under the legislation councils can also exact a monetary payment from developers for any car parking space that council decides to waive. Glen Eira does not have such a clause in its existing overlays. Here is what some other councils collect if they decide to waive one spot –

Campaspe – $2000 per space

Cardinia – $16,935 (excl. GST) per space

Casey – $16,935 (excl. GST) per space

Colac – $13,000 (excluding GST)) per space

Greater Bendigo – $10,000 per space (no GST) per space

Greater Dandenong – $19,000 (excl. GST) per space

Monash – $11,000 (plus GST) per space

The minutes for the last Bayside City Council included the following –

Council has commenced the preparation of Car Parking Plans for the four Major Activity Centres of Bay Street, Brighton; Church Street, Brighton; Hampton Street, Hampton; and Sandringham Village, Sandringham to better manage car parking in these centres. The Car Parking Plans will provide the basis for Parking Overlays, to form part of the Bayside Planning Scheme. A Parking Overlay can be applied to a geographic area and can regulate financial contributions (such as cash in lieu scheme) amongst a range of other car parking management improvements.

We have been told that under the old Caulfield City Council regime developers paid $10,000 per car park waiver. This is now gone. How much money could Council have collected in the last 14 years? How much public car parking space could have been purchased to assist in alleviating what is now a nightmare for residents?

But it gets even worse once comparisons are made with the finer points of the various schedules that other councils have introduced. Councils can determine the number of spaces for various commercial uses. Glen Eira in its 2 parking overlays has basically stuck to the minimalist ResCode guidelines. They even argue in their planning officer reports that since a shop is ‘small’ that no parking is required, or that loading bays can be waived. Not so other councils. Here are some examples that show what can be done when there is the will to protect local amenity –

Office

Boroondara – Office 3.5 spots to each 100 sq m of net floor area)

PLEASE NOTE THAT for the Caulfield Village Council has 2 per 100square metres for office.

Manningham – 2.5 per 100 square metres

Casey – 3.5 per 100 square metres

Restaurant

Manningham – 0.36 for every seat available

Monash – 0.45 spaces to each seat available .

Shop

Monash – 4 To each per 100 sq m of leasable floor area

Banyule – 4.6 for shop

Casey – 4 for any shop under 2000 square metres

There are plenty more categories (ie offices, supermarkets) where other councils have far exceeded what ResCode states. Not only has Glen Eira done literally nothing to address the parking concerns of residents but they have literally squandered the opportunity to garner hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars over the years which could have been used to purchase property (as the planning scheme states) and alleviate the congestion in activity centres and the flow on effects to local streets.

The failure to act is in keeping with so much that is amiss within Glen Eira. Of course, introducing Parking Overlays that actually address the problem would mean:

• Current and effective analysis and possibly decent structure planning
• It would also go against the grain of a council that is so developer friendly!

Two things stand out like sore thumbs when it comes to development applications and the submitted plans:

• They are often inaccurate and simply WRONG
• Council has no intention of doing its own required homework. They are more often than not content to rely exclusively on the developer’s documentation – especially on such vital aspects as traffic management and overshadowing.

Recent planning conferences verify the above completely. There have also been some incredible statements that have issued from the various architects and planners working for the developer. For example:

On the Belsize, 4 storey and 52 dwelling application the planner conceded that the balconies (which encroached on setbacks) were largely there for ‘aesthetic’ value. Otherwise the building would look ‘like a box’!!!!!! Topping this off was the comment from the project architect when it was pointed out that the ‘standards’ on permeability, etc. had not been met. His response? – Under the standard it allows for breaching. Needless to say this was met with howls of laughter!

When residents raised concerns about the water table and what damage excavating for a double underground car park would do to the table and surrounds, the response from both the council and developer planner, was that there was no Melbourne Water Overlay on the property. That of course doesn’t answer the question and nor does it safeguard residents since the permit can be issued, problems subsequently confronted, and the damage is done. The $64 question is whether any of these things will even get a mention in the officer’s report and recommendation? And even if it is mentioned, has there been ‘consultation’ with appropriate engineering expertise?

Residents also picked up numerous ‘clerical errors’ and what can only be described as inadequate traffic reports from developers. The Penang Street planner admitted that the submitted plans included dwellings that were marked as two bedroom, which were in fact single bedroom dwellings. But it got a lot worse. According to the submitted shadow diagrams, everything was hunkey dorey! There was no overshadowing that did not meet the ResCode standards. Or so they would like everyone to believe. It was only when one resident pointed out that she had photographic evidence of a current room full of sunshine that would now be facing a three storey blank wall, that the ‘inaccuracies’ of the plans were revealed.

Some of the best quotes however came from the Loranne St (4 storey, 42 dwellings) planning conference. Hyams, who chaired the meeting, is literally starting to sound like a broken record! Once again he began the evening with assertions that the new zones did not add to development and that anyone who was telling people something different must have ‘political motives’. The plans that were available were practically indecipherable so that it was impossible to ascertain the sizes of each apartment. Also missing from the handout was the requisite shadow diagram for the equinox – ie September 22^nd at 3pm!

Rachel Bowden represented the developer. We remind readers that she was at one time a senior planner for Council. And didn’t she sound it! Council’s public relations department could not have done a better job than the praise that Ms Bowden lavished on council! We guess that the planning/development circles are small, and certainly incestuous! When it came to answering questions about ‘quality’, all Ms Bowden could provide as an answer, were statements about setbacks, height, and how everything was in accordance with the planning scheme. Not a word of course about basic internal amenity in relation to quality – except that the developer would ‘keep’ some of the units and therefore have control over the Body Corporate. The implication being that this was unlike other developments. When pressed as to whether this meant they would be ‘rented’ out, the answer of course, had to be ‘yes’. Oh the games that these people play!

Our advice for all future objectors on any development is:

• Check the developer’s plans carefully and ensure that they are accurate in every single respect
• Check the accompanying traffic report – make sure that the ‘survey’ was conducted at a reasonable time and on more than one single day – ie the Penang Street traffic survey occurred on one single day at 9am and again at 7pm. Totally inadequate since there is a retirement village right next door and visitors are not likely to be parking and filling up the streets before 9am and certainly not much after 7pm. Some of the Penang people also went to the trouble of ‘measuring’ the supposed car parking available spots. Guess what? – the plans were wrong again!
• Harass, harangue every single councillor. Get publicity! Tell your neighbours, tell your friends. Tell anyone who will listen that your problems will soon become their problems because of the Glen Eira Planning Scheme and the councillors who permitted this to occur in secret and without community consultation.

Finally, that old chestnut of planning decisions. Each and every time residents are told that the officer’s decision on the application will be made available on the FRIDAY afternoon. Council meetings are on the following Tuesday evening. As we’ve stated ad nauseum – people work; people may be reluctant to intrude into councillors’ weekends. That basically leaves two days for residents to absorb the detail, and attempt to lobby councillors. Not good enough. We see no reason why officer decisions on any planning application should not be made available far earlier. Councillors receive their agendas at least 8 days prior to the council meeting. Why should residents only have a few days?

And why oh why are all of these extremely important planning decisions all being crammed into the one single council meeting? What that means is that we estimate that each item will be lucky to receive 5 or 10 minutes of ‘debate’ time. Not good enough when people’s lives and lifestyles are being decided. The advantage for council is of course that everything is done and dusted in the one 2 or 3 hour period. The more the merrier, so to speak, so that everything blurs into one time slot and the pressure cannot be repeated meeting after meeting. This has traditionally been council’s tactics. All decisions of major import somehow manage to find themselves on the one single agenda. Coincidence? Not bloody likely we say!