The Beagle Editor,
Personal happiness is complex but is driven by fulfilment or disappointment of personal expectations.
The ESC has guidelines for developers and builders. These are meant to, amongst other things protect me from any aberrant building behaviour of my neighbour and vice versa.
I have a hope that my sunshine rights, air space, view sharing and streetscape harmony will be maintained. While small deviations may well be permitted in a few unusual circumstances the current Australian local government scene appears to be far closer to a free for all.
Locally , as Cr Mayne outlined at the last ESC meeting we are slowly heading towards the Gold Coast. The quarter acre block (1000 sq metres ) has been replaced by 450 to 700 sq m.
It now seems acceptable that most of these residences do not have a yard to kick a ball. If your land is greater than 900sq m you appear to have a good chance for either a second house or subdivision. Suburbia is littered with new neighbours encroaching on people who imagined they were living in low density.
The tone of the advertisement for the Batemans Bay Bowling Club site sale 12 to 18 months ago was, give us your development ideas, do not take the book of rules on guidelines too seriously, and we will consider your proposal. We assume you have deep pockets.
Council openly said in their EIO documentation that: The Site is currently zoned as RE2 (Private Recreation) under the Eurobodalla Local Environmental Plan 2012. In preparing and submitting a Response, Respondents should not consider this zoning as a constraint. That is because depending on Council’s assessment of the merits of the proposed development, Council will consider making a planning proposal to change the zoning to support the proposed option(s) provided in the Response. It was most disturbing that Cr Mayne appeared friendless last Tuesday. Moving to acreage does not seem to help in our local area as a recent Surf Beach case showed. We need to move away from this dopey thinking towards greater consideration of social needs and wants. Owen Cartledge. Malua Bay. Further reading: Old Bowling Club site: still no interest in this Gateway to the Bay
