Ballarat Heritage Watch takes council to VCAT over six-storey building that ‘threatens the very nature’ of town
A community group is taking the council to court to fight an approval for a “brutalist” six-storey development in the middle of town they claim “threatens the very nature of Ballarat”.
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A community group is taking the council to court to fight an approval for a “brutalist” six-storey development in the middle of town they claim “threatens the very nature of Ballarat”.
Ballarat Heritage Watch Inc, a not for profit community organisation, is crowd-funding $20,000 to take the City of Ballarat to VCAT to appeal the council’s decision to approve a six-storey building at 222 Mair St in the CBD.
BHW president Stuart Kelly said the development was “inappropriate” and a “rather unfortunate design” to be built next to early Federation era buildings, saying the building height would be “excessive”.
Mr Kelly said the group wasn’t opposing development, instead they were demanding that developments be “sympathetic” to the surrounding heritage architecture in the city of Ballarat.
“This building is going to be something like 27m high, and it’s beside a building – which is in the heritage precinct – which is only 10m,” he said.
“It’ll stand out like a sore thumb quite frankly.”
Mr Kelly said the approval from council was “dramatically at odds” with the Ballarat Planning Scheme which stated developments must “avoid new buildings or extensions dominating the streetscape”.
“We believe council’s decision to allow a six-storey development in an area which is part of a heritage precinct threatens a drastic reshaping of historic Ballarat,” he said.
A heritage impact statement commissioned by the developer acknowledged the new building would “clearly bring about a change to the setting” but claimed it would “not have an unacceptable impact upon the significance of the broader heritage overlay precinct”.
Mr Kelly said the approval at Mair St came after other similar development approvals and he was concerned the latest approval could set a precedent that could “threaten the very nature of Ballarat”.
“We’ve been very concerned about the way Council has been moving in the last couple of years. They’ve approved a number of five and six storey buildings,” he said.
“There seems to be a view among councillors that Ballarat needs to accept higher buildings in order to attract developers.
“Given the planning scheme’s current lack of mandatory height restrictions within the CBD, approval of this application will be seized upon as a clear signal to developers that Ballarat CBD is wide open to ever taller buildings even in the most historic areas of Ballarat.
“This will make nonsense of the frequent claims by Council of the importance of the city’s heritage.”
Ballarat council development and growth director Joanna Cuscaden said in response to the VCAT action on behalf of council: “If a member of the community does not agree with a planning decision, we respect their right to appeal to the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal for an independent review.”
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