Planning and development services

The new Regional Planning Scheme is the centre-piece of the 2010/11 Budget allocation for Planning and Development Services.

Planning and Development Services portfolio leader Cr Peter Marks said $3.83 million had been allocated to the scheme over three years. This includes expenditure on background studies, local area plans and the Planning Scheme drafting.

“Council is looking to achieve a more environmentally, economically and socially sustainable outcome through the new Planning Scheme, such as the creation of stronger activity centres and increasing the density around these centres to enhance opportunities for effective and efficient public transport.

“The new Planning Scheme will provide a new direction in housing with a broader choice of housing types, such as detached, duplex or medium density housing in areas well serviced by infrastructure. It will also identify areas for increased growth in commercial and industrial property within major activity centres throughout the region.

“These major activity centres will be strengthened and supported by reducing the red tape involved in getting approvals.

“We will continue to ensure that development enhances the opportunity for more efficient transport. Public transport has repeatedly been highlighted as a major priority in our community engagement activities and will increasingly be so as the population ages.”

Cr Marks said all the good work done on the City Centre Master Planning project would continue through the integration of the plan into the capital works program over the next five years and beyond.

“The City Centre Master Plan provides a great basis for growing our CBD in a measured and well-thought-out way. Council will use the master plan as a framework for our decision-making and budget allocations in the future that will facilitate the planning for catalytic projects within the centre.

“As made clear in the launch of this project, implementation of the City Centre Master Plan will be a partnership investment between council, the state and private industry over the long term and ongoing funds will be sourced from a range of capital and strategic planning budgets.

“In addition, the Priority Infrastructure Plan (PIP) will continue to be drafted at a cost of $1.75 million. The PIP is an important part of the Planning Scheme in that it will provide council with the ability to equitably charge for infrastructure at the development stage.

“It also provides an opportunity for the community to become involved in identifying the desired standard of services that are relevant to the future growth of the city and the region. The PIP will enable the provision of infrastructure at the time it is needed and on a ‘user pays’ basis rather than being a further impost on existing ratepayers.

“We have completed seven local plans and there are a further five to follow this financial year as part of a five year program.

“These local plans provide details about things like open space, housing density distribution, local road hierarchies, the locations of local retail conveniences and potential public transport routes.”

“Also in this budget, funds will be released for regional level planning which will carry forward work done for the Strategic Directions community planning project and work that comes out of the Planning Scheme background studies.

“This financial year, we will see the consolidation of work undertaken in the preceding years. It will bring together important policy delivery platforms such as the Regional Planning Scheme, the Priority Infrastructure Plan, the Regional Strategy Plan and various environmental policies,” Cr Marks said.

“Following the establishment of the regional council in 2008, the inaugural elected councillors set the target of completing a single integrated planning scheme recognising the uniqueness of local areas by December 2011. This massive and challenging project remains on track.

“I’d like to take this opportunity to acknowledge the work done by council’s Planning and Engineering staff, for which I sincerely thank them.”