At its February meeting, Kiama council considered a proposed modification to a mixed use development comprising of five shops, eight professional suites and 29 residential units at 128 Belinda Street, Gerringong.

The report considered a request by the applicant to modify the approved development by raising the finished height of the Belinda Street component of the building by 550mm, “resulting in additional breach of council’s 11m building height development standard”.

In June 2015, council approved the mixed use development, which involved a height breach of up to 350mm above the 11m maximum height limit.

“This height variation is central to the site and not impacting on street elevations,” council’s report stated. 

The approved building has two principal components: the front component on the corner of Noble and Belinda streets; and the eastern component which extends along Belinda Street toward the rear boundary.

The proposal sought to modify the eastern component by increasing its height by 550mm to match the Noble/Belinda Street component.

The modified development increases the finished building height by 550mm to reach a maximum height of 11.9m at this point.

At the February meeting, the majority of councillors voted in favour of the recommendation that council approve the variation to maximum building under the Kiama Local Environmental Plan 2011, to allow for the maximum height of up to 11.9 metres.

They also resolved to approve the proposed modified development under the Environmental Planning and Assessment Act.

At the meeting, Mayor Brian Petschler expressed concerns regarding the increased height being part of an ongoing trend. 

“It just seems to me that we’re constantly dealing with matters that always exceed, our push the limits on various planning boundaries,” he said. 

“One of the major criticisms we’re receiving lately is of these large, bulky buildings.”

Council’s environmental services director Phil Costello said “that section of the building had quite a presence on to Belinda Street… The raising of it gives it greater accessibility from Belinda Street”. 

“It is a greater presence in the streetscape, so that the shops become more active and you have a better activation between the actual street itself and the proposed development.”

Mr Costello said in this instance it was a site where the increase in height really had no impact because of the nature of the surrounding development and its location. 

Councillor Kathy Rice expressed concerns. 

“At the moment we’re working with our existing LEP… Under the existing LEP, what is there about this development that is going to stop continued development applications being put before us stretching the height limit by a metre?

“I feel like it is going to easily become a precedent.

“I just feel like we’re not really doing the community any justice by accepting a development that is now well beyond what we should be accepting with our LEP.”

Cr Neil Reilly said that although “this is a good development”, due to limited tourist accommodation being available he proposed that two of the units be used for holiday rental purposes. 

“While I accept the director’s response that there probably is no real nexus with regard to the building and the allocation of maybe two of those units being used for holiday rental purposes, there’s no nexus between the building exceeding our stated building height and the plans that we’re seeing,” he said.

“We’ve said this is the height, and then they’ve said ‘no, this is what they want’, and I know from so many DAs that we’ve received here, sometimes it appears as though it’s death by a thousand cuts, or death in 500 millimetre increments.”

On the topic of whether council wished to change the classification of two of the units so that they weren’t approved as residential flats, but approved as tourist accommodation, Mr Costello said council should consider “having regard to the fact that units of that ilk are often used for short-term rental”.

“It may be that the proponent would come back and say, we will always guarantee that two of them will be used for short-term rental without changing the classification of them,” he said. 

Council also resolved that this proposal be a concessional request. 

Post-meeting, Cr Petschler said the municipality had a planning policy to limit the growth of the towns.

“On the one hand we’ve got people wanting the character, which is single dwellings on half-acres to remain, they don’t want the boundaries of the town to extend... Land values have reached the point now where the developers need to put a number of units on a block to get their return.

“My concern is that we’re asked after the event so to speak to vary our height levels again, for what appears to be good reasons, to make better access for the public at ground level.

“But we’re still asked to increase our height level.

“And that’s the biggest thing you get when you go to Gerringong is these ugly big buildings up the top of the hill, and the same in Manning Street (with) these ugly unit buildings. 

“So we’ve got to try and find a balance… Which will allow the development to let us get the unit numbers we’ve got to get under the (regional) growth plan, but in a way which is acceptable to the community.”