Proposal to rezone club land

Gosford Council will consider a proposal to rezone Ettalong Beach Memorial Club land to allow up to seven storeys on December 14.

The club has applied to rezone its land from "Special Uses" to "General Business", and to remove the existing three-storey height limit that currently applies to the site.

This would permit a mixed residential commercial retail development varying in height from two to seven storeys, which would replace the existing four-storey Ettalong War Memorial Club building.

The land adjoins the site of the Ettalong Beach Resort.

Under the approval for the resort, two levels of car parking were to be provided on the land, one at basement level and the other at ground level.

A council report stated that the rezoning proposal for the site included some unique circumstances.

The first was the applicant's submission that the basement car park on the site was due to be constructed early next year, and the development potential of the subject site needed to be determined now, so that footings could be sized and constructed accordingly.

The second consideration was that council was at the early stages of reviewing planning controls for the Peninsula, including Ettalong Town Centre, and the new directions were yet to be considered by council.

Given the footings issue, and the significant scale of the development, the proposal was therefore assessed against the new planning directions in order to ensure the proposal had a strategic context, and to ensure the it was consistent with the new planning directions that would be presented to council early next year.

The third consideration was that the proposal provided opportunity to screen the rear of the nine-storey resort building.

Council officers recommended that council support the preparation of a draft local environmental plan for the club land.

Council agenda EP.63, December 7