Changes proposed to setback wording

Changes to the wording of waterfront setback and building height requirements are being proposed by Gosford Council.

The amendments to Council development control plans (DCPs) will be put on public exhibition in the near future.

The changes come after Peninsula residents have protested at the implementation of waterfront setback provisions in DCP 155 for recent development applications at Woy Woy and Orange Grove.

The changes are designed to reinforce the Council's current setback policy, removing ambiguity from the DCP wording.

Height requirements will be changed to encourage houses to "step down" a slope, rather than being set on a high and prominent platform.

But local residents have claimed that Council's current setback policy will increase bulk on the waterfront, where the intention of DCP 155 was to reduce it.

Woy Woy residents Norbert and Karin Solondz last week claimed that it will create a "beach creeper" effect, encouraging wall-to-wall double storey buildings on the waterfront.

Council's development assessment unit manager Mr Gary Lofts, who drafted both the original DCP and the changes, has denied this.

However, a staff report to the Council stated that a number of properties existed in older areas where buildings were much closer to the water than the permitted six metre setback.

The requirement to observe a foreshore building line similar to the line of existing houses was intended to permit the erection of building closer to the water than the general six metre building line, according to the report.

"Some difficulty has been experienced when redevelopment of a site required new dwellings to be sited further back than their neighbours," it stated.

Council had received a number of complaints that owners of new dwellings were suffering loss of outlook or views.

"A policy which adopts only a fixed building line and has no regard to loss of view will generate complaints for staff," the report stated.

Mr Lofts said that the existing DCP could be read in several ways.

He said the amendment "does not change the current control, only rewords it".

"Basically what we are stating is that people must first look at the existing building line, but if one is not present then they must use the rule of six metres for a single storey dwelling and 10 metres for a double storey portion of a dwelling."

Mr Lofts said this had always been council policy.

"We are just making it clearer."

Mr Lofts said that changes to building height requirements were also being proposed.

"Currently building heights have two controls." Mr Lofts said.

One is for steep land, land with a slope over 20 per cent, and the other for flatter land.

They differ in that flatter blocks have an additional condition, which limits the maximum height to the top of the uppermost floor to four metres.

As a result the present policy allows houses to be built on land having a slope more than 20 per cent that are much higher than dwellings erected on flatter slopes, said Mr Lofts.

This had caused problems in the size of houses and difficulty for council staff in determining the actual height of houses on steeper slopes because the building envelope is difficult to assess on land that may slope in different directions, he said.

Mr Lofts said that he believed the policy should be amended to require a maximum four metres to the floor of the topmost floor on all dwellings.

The introduction of a four metre requirement would encourage designers to step houses down a slope rather than maintain a plane, which produces a high and often prominent building.

Lyle Stone, February 16 Council agenda DH.10, February 1