As a community are we truly supportive of Infill Development?

Or are we still supportive so long as it doesn’t turn up in our backyard? Personally, I believe the vast majority of the community are supportive of quality infill development and understand that whilst it comes with some compromises the positives far outweigh these. Perhaps the issue is we don’t yet have a system in place that sufficiently manages the voice of the community as a whole. And by whole, I mean those that presently live within a community and those that aspire to live in a community. Perhaps we also haven’t yet found a way to succinctly explain why 4 to 6 storey development generally speaking isn’t commercially viable nor what most of the end occupants want. That is a diverse mix of housing choice and affordability within their community.

Earlier this month we attended a City of Vincent full council meeting whereby our approved mixed-use town centre apartment project, Alma Square, had the viewing tower up for development approval. This is for a viewing tower already approved to be erected (for 90 days) and installed on the site of a fully approved mixed-use development of over 100 studio, one, two, three and four bedroom apartments, plus over 1,500m2 of ground floor retail and food and beverage offerings in the heart of the North Perth town centre. The highest part of our development will be nine stories tall when completed. This viewing tower is a temporary structure that won’t be quite six stories in height and was strategically located over 40 metres from the nearest residential neighbour and in consultation with the City’s planning officers. Currently local planning policy states if you need it up for more than 3 months from issue of the building license you need to apply for a development approval and embark on a 90 day process. Generally a development of this scale requires 6 to 12 months to achieve the necessary pre-sales to satisfy lender requirements,?so the City officers went to work completing a 36 page comprehensive, thorough, diligent and objective report which ultimately recommended planning approval of this temporary structure. Additionally they wrote to the 200 nearest residents asking for their comments and if such letter secures more than 5 objections, it goes to a council meeting.

After 28 days of public advertising, the City received 21 objections and so off to the council meeting we go. The best objection I read was, “I’m only objecting because I didn’t agree with the approval for the development to go ahead.” Some neighbours latched on to the fact that only 3 of the 24 responses in total were positive suggesting that 90% of the community was against the viewing tower. The West Australian reported “Stairway to invasion of privacy! North Perth locals have slammed a 20m viewing platform for the Celsius development at 367-369 Fitzgerald Street as an invasion of privacy, claiming it overlooks nearby homes and back gardens.” An opportunity to balance the article by including the fact that 200 residents were written to was missed.

So my question is, when will the silent majority’s interest be counted? When will we start quoting real numbers such as 200 residents were written to and only 24 thought it was important enough to respond. Or do we need to be more specific in our community consultation to ensure the silent majority understand that if they stay silent, the noisy minority will continue to walk around stating half-truths around the level of objection across the community.

Perhaps a little less surprising, is that since the viewing tower has been erected onsite with some surrounding hoarding signage, there has been over 110 downloads of the onsite QR code and over 270 enquiries to date with no other marketing in place. So maybe the silent local majority don’t see the need to respond to community consultation and instead get active when they are afforded an opportunity to secure a new home offering housing choice within their community.

I’m pleased to say, the viewing tower was unanimously approved by the elected members but you could sense they hadn’t been surrounded by positivity from the silent majority.

Later that same week, Matt Evans attended the town hall meeting in Floreat, called by Basil Zempilas to “hear from the community” around the proposed redevelopment of Floreat Forum. Whilst I was not in attendance, Matt informed me that the meeting included speakers against the Floreat Forum development, the Blackburne City Beach development, the UEM Subi East development and even the West Leederville development precinct.

The same arguments were raised that we faced at Elysian Subiaco and Alma Square North Perth. We aren’t against development, it just needs to be sensible (read of a height and scale that is not commercially viable). At Elysian Subiaco the progress association vehemently opposed an initial four storey development proposed by our JV Partner. When we lodged a six storey development this same group lobbied hard to say they were supportive of four!

So my question to the community and potential future government is, if we do not support commercially viable, infill development across Floreat, City Beach, Subiaco and West Leederville, then where do we think it is appropriate… North Perth these active groups may perhaps suggest!

I’m hoping Basil calls another meeting and invites those that are pro-development to attend and provide their feedback too.

In the meantime we will soldier on, working diligently to create beautiful mixed-use infill developments that are good for both the community above (60 – 80% local owner occupier residents) and the surrounding community.

All the very best,

Richard