Sydney Architect wanted to help push council.

Hi everyone,

A good friend has a house in Marrickville-Sydney which is 17x17m2. On his block he has built a garage/office which he uses as a self contained man-cave.

His family own the property directly next door which is exactly the same size land and house type as his.

His family now want to build something similar or ideally sub divide to build something similar, on their land as well but a face to face meeting with the architect and town planner seemed negative.

It seems like the council won't allow his family to build the exact same thing that my friend has already built directly next door in which he has set precedence.

Here is the response that the architect has written to my friend in regards to his proposed family development..

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"I went to council and spoke with the Duty Planner in regards to subdividing the site and building a secondary dwelling

item 1 - Subdivision the general comment was even though its allowable your site will not meet the general criteria of the consistent lot widths in the street - that is the requirement

item 2 - secondary dwelling the general comment was its allowable but must adhere to the private open space requirement of 24m2 which must be 4m x 4m and the existing house must meet the requirements as well so a detailed analysis is required to determine were to position the secondary dwelling ie they dont want what you did at your house - they prefer the dwelling to be at the rear not at the front"
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In regards to Item 2, how they prefer the dwelling to be at the rear, I just want to point out that with my friend's existing development that the dwelling is on the side not the read.. Why aren't they allowing the new development that his family want to do to be at the side as well?

My friend needs an architect who knows the law in regards to the precedence that was already set and who is familiar with the Sydney Inner West Council, who is prepared to fight for him to try to push this through. My friend is happy to pay a premium for either an architect or laywer willing to go the extra mile with this.



-Frank

 

@Depreciator may know someone

 

He does.

Frank, there is a local (Marrickville) architect I know called Peter Olive. He used to be a councillor (Greens) on the old Marrickville council, so he knows how it all works. He doesn't advertise, so see if you can send him a message by Facebook or Linked in. Tell him Scott from Renwick Street told you to get in touch. If you have no luck, let me know and I'll wander round to his house and tell him he needs to make it easier for people to get in touch with him.

 

Hi Frank, I'm in Victoria so I can't comment specifically on NSW but you've mentioned "precedence". Precedence in general anywhere will only be relevant when a proposed development is assessed under the same (identical) planning provisions as these are constantly changing. The individual 'objective' opinion of the planner underlies the policies. In Victoria the change is non-stop when you include the Council areas on top of State Government policies. Do speak to someone who is familiar with State AND Local Policies but I'd caution on assuming whats been done before, can be done now. Good Luck & Cheers!

 

There wouldn't be many instances of architects pushing councils but plenty of examples of councils pushing architects around.

I MAY be lodging a DA with City of Sydney in the next few months. I cringe at the thought and the can of worms it may open up.

 

I will try contact him, thanks


-Frank

 

Frank, it could come down to what the new space is called. You said your mate's building is a 'garage/office that he uses as a man cave'. That is a different proposition altogether to a 'secondary dwelling', so the existing building might not really be a valid precedent.
That bloke Peter is helping somebody else we know now with something. She wanted to add a 4th bedroom to her house, but there were issues and crazy council costs. The architect she was using said that's the way it goes. I told her to talk to Peter and I think he suggested she not call it a 4th bedroom (despite what it ultimately gets used for) and for some reason the problems were reduced.

 

I'm in a similar situation to Lacrim with potentially lodging a DA with COS.
Although it looks straightforward to me, I also cringe at the thought of how it will play out.

 

If it is office/ man cave less than 20sqm then it doesn't need council approval if you tick certain boxes. Melwood homes does something like it.

If they are planing on doing secondary dwelling then maybe have a chat with @Brazen .

 

In my experience Inner West (ex Leichhardt or Marrickville) are much worse than City of Sydney unfortunately (or fortunately for some). COS seem quite progressive and I have dealt with one excellent council planner there in particular. Although they still use precedence when it suits them ie "there is no precedence of this happening so you can't have it", but if you ask for something that is existing they say "that was approved under a previous LEP and now we have a new one which doesn't support it"

 

Meristone’s comment about precedence is spot on.

If you want to push the boundaries I recommend that you also engage an experienced consultant town planner to write a statement of environmental effects and clause 4.6 requests to support the variations. The planner should also know how to use loopholes and Land and Environment Court planning principles in your advantage in the DA application.