People in the community should have a right to appeal against planning decisions, according to the chair of the ACT Legislative Assembly’s planning and infrastructure committee, David Lamont.
But a leading Canberra developer said Canberrs should get away from urban guerilla war on a block-by-block basis.
Mr Lamont said last week (week ends april 24) he was personally in favour of granting third-party appeal rights in planning cases, but it was a matter for the committee.
The committee is looking at the Draft Territory Plan. At present only parties directly affected can appeal against design and siting applications. Third-party appeal rights are restricted to lease-purpose appeals.
This leaves community groups and conservation and heritage organisation in the cold.
The general rift at present is that developers want a set of guidelines and if they meet them they should go ahead. Community and resident groups say they would like to see the detail of a developer’s proposal (the design and siting) and then object if they think it bad.
Mr Lamont said he was in favour of giving rights to outside parties to appeal against design and siting of new projects.
“”We should set up a very workable user-friendly appeals process with a very expeditious time frame in it, so that you establish the mechanism that allows proper public notification, consultation and an appeal where a third party still feels aggreived, but they have got to demonstate how what’s being done is not in community’s interest,” he said.
He thought this could accomodate both developers’ interests and the public’s.
“”I don’t think public wants judicial process,” he said. “”People want an appeals process, but not a judicial one because of the cost and time. There may be some progessively smart things we can do here.”
There was a lot of public concern about the planning process, but it was mainly directed at design and siting and energy efficiency. The concern over the first North Canberra in-fill project, in Torrens Street, was a good example.
Third-party rights and the way they have been exercised have been a long running sore in Canberra. Before self-government, appeals against changes to lease purposes could only be made to the Supreme Court. Both developers and community groups thought this too expensive.
Developer Bob Winnel condemned legalistic appeal rights last week. The Conservation Council of Canberra has supported third-party appeal rights and has condemned the new planning law in the ACT for not allowing them. The council wants to see a process where residents and community groups can appeal without undue cost and delay.
The director of the council, Rodney Falconer, said last week that the council recognised need for a system that was not abused by vexatious litigation. But there as a need to get away fromt he adversary system where one party was wholly right and the other wholly wrong.
At present the Department of Environment Land and Planning set the rules, judged whether a development was met them and then heard objections. There was a need for an impartial body to hear appeals.
Developer Bob Winnel said, “”The appeal system creates a system ripe for michievous delay and the reign of the Queen’s Counsel.”
He wanted certainty. Once the guidelines were established on what a developer could or could not do, the only appeal right should be whether a development fell outside the guidelines.
There should be no general appeal on design and siting.
“”You cannot legislate for asthetics,” he said. “”Sometimes good urban design can emerge from a thousand errors.”
After a time the market would promote good design. People would seek it out and pay for it, he said. Developers wanted certainty and wanted to get away from being seen to be in conflict with the community.
The ACT had to get away from “”an urban guerrilla war on a block-by-block basis.< pc Point to feature on Kingston