Concerns Over New Housing Unit Code

Recently a colleague came to me with a familiar situation. He and his neighbours were fighting against a small unit development adjoining their properties. The reasons were also familiar in that the two double storey units inadvertently blocked the views of the adjacent single storey residents, overlooked their rear yards and decreased their property values.

Unit development is driven in part by a concept of what known as ‘urban consolidation’. Simply this means if you increase the number of dwellings in existing residential areas of the city, then there will be less requirements for new infrastructure (roads, pipes and schools), decreases in car use and increased viability of services (such as buses or grocery stores). Whilst this is goodstrategy in many respects, it can be at the cost of the amenity of existing residents.

Politically aware Councillors have for many years sought to balance the need for the benefits of reduced infrastructure costs, development and increased numbers of ratepayers against the amenity of existing residents. This has been difficult because the amenity issues,such as loss of view, privacy and solar access are somewhat subjective. Accordingly, Councils have covered themselves by making the ‘use’ of a site for units at the discretion of Council to approve or refuse, which has the added benefit also requiring notification of residents prior the construction machinery rolling on to the site.

Driven by just calls from the development industry for more clarity, certainty and consistency in standards, the Government has responded by producing Planning Directive 4.1(an update of its existing Single Dwelling Planning Directive 4)which provides consistent standards across the state for unit development. Importantly, unit developments that comply with the standards will be ‘permitted’ which means they will not be notified or advertised to existing residents and Council will be obliged to approve the application (subject to permit conditions). This ‘permitted’ status applies to densities above 325sqm per unit, that is all lots greater than 650sqm are potential ‘permitted’ unit development sites. The height of ‘permitted’ unit development under the new Planning Directive maintains the 8.5m height limit currently applicable to ‘permitted’ single dwellings under the current Planning Directive 4 which equates to a two storey structure with a pitched roof on a flat site.

The new Planning Directive will apply to all residential zones across the state and will override any other provisions relating to unit development standards. It will apply to existing ‘interim’ planning schemes, which include most of the north and north-western Councils, from the 28th February. It will be also written into southern regional interim schemes, which are expected to be gazetted later this year.

Whilst there is no doubt that there should be consistency and certainty for developers, such broadly applicable policies should be very conservative in nature, particularly when removing opportunity for scrutiny in localised situations. There is an assumption in the new Planning Directive and most existing planning schemes that all residential zones are suitable for higher density residential development, regardless of how such well such areas are serviced.

A preferred approach would be if State Government, Local Government and Taswater carefully assessed residential areas as to their infrastructure and services capacity and permit unit development only in areas with a high level of such capacity. Consideration should also be given to the appropriateness of small lot by lot unit development as opposed to incentivised large project development in specific locations (such as ferry nodes or bus corridors) which achieve better outcomes in terms of urban design and focused servicing.Further, the components of residential amenity such as views, solar access and privacy are critical to our quality of life and where they are likely to be significantly affected, both Council and residents should have the ability to influence the design of proposals.

Mat Clark is the immediate Past President of the Planning Institute of Australia Tasmanian Division