Boarding house on Flagstaff St + GSV Planning Proposal

Hi Everyone,

Boarding House DA

For those who live nearby, you might have received a letter in yesterday’s post about a boarding house proposed to be built at 2 Flagstaff Street. Fortunately you can disregard the comment in the letter about needing to attend Council to view the DA, as Council has now uploaded it to the website also, available at http://www.huntershill.nsw.gov.au/Page/Page.aspx?Page_Id=1331

We have not had a chance to review, yet, but want to let you know about it ASAP.

You might recall that a boarding house DA was lodged for 126 Victoria Road(just below Tennis Ranch) recently and was refused by Ryde Council. There will be a hearing for that application at the Land and Environment Court today (Wednesday 7th March) at 4pm. We will update you when we know more.

Please note that submissions on the Flagstaff St boarding house DA should be sent to  council@huntershill.nsw.gov.au by Friday 16th March 2018.

Planning Proposal to add up to another 100 flats (180 flats becomes 280 flats) on the Gladesville Shopping ‘Village’ site

We are still preparing our information for distribution and will get it to you ASAP, but be under no illusion: This planning proposal is not an attempt to strengthen safeguards against poor development or any other community minded initiative you might wish Hunters Hill Council to have undertaken.

This planning proposal was sought by the applicant who wants to increase the Local Environmental Plan (LEP) controls (Height and FSR) applicable to the site. The planning proposal is meant to allow up to an additional 100 flats on that site alone (and to allow ~16 storeys), which is already zoned with controls that would permit approximately 180 flats to be build on it – already allowed up to 10 storeys high.

Some people have read Council’s submission form at the back of the handout materials distributed at last week’s information session, and thought that the questions being asked only with reference to the favourable elements means that we can just choose to have favourable elements. The favourable elements, being the requirement to meet design excellence, and to provide open space, are PART OF the planning proposal which seeks to amend the LEP. The applicant has bought our land off the Council and now wants NSW government approval to amend locally developed planning instruments, to build bigger and build more – for their benefit.

This confusion may also be reinforced if people read page 6 of Hunters Hill Council News dated March 2018 (distributed on or around Friday last week), which is concerning in how little attention is given to the extra 100 flats intended to be jammed on to that site.

Hunters Hill Council could have pursued the favourable elements of the proposed LEP amendment any time since the 2013 DA was lodged, generating nearly 300 submissions – 98% of which were negative. They’re well aware of how Gladesville residents feel about the quality of redevelopment we’re supposed to have inflicted upon us, and Council hasn’t changed the LEP in 4+ years. Instead, the Planning Proposal has been sought by the applicant, which owns GS’V’, and wants more height and more bulk.

We view the favourable elements as intended distractions, designed to elicit complacency or confuse residents into thinking that the favourable elements are readily available and to distract from the further grab for commercial profit at cost to community amenity written into the proposed height and FSR amendments. At best, they are intended as compensation or trade-off, for the extra benefit to be given to the developer.

It beggars belief that the pedestrian and vehicular congestion, competition for transport, school and other services, and impact on parking of 100 EXTRA FLATS ON THAT SITE ALONE – are somehow supposed to be properly offset by a bit of extra open space!.

We will be distributing information to assist you with making submissions, soon.

– From the team at Gladesville Community Group.