Whaka Feedlot owner Morgan Pastoral takes TRC to court over road upgrade conditions of development

After a year and a half of negotiations trying to have a road upgrade condition removed from their development approval, this feedlotter has taken Toowoomba Regional Council to court.

A business who has been in negotiations with Toowoomba Regional Council over conditions of a new feedlot development since April 2018 has taken the council to the Planning and Environment Court.

Morgan Pastoral applied for a development application to expand its Whaka Feedlot, near Quinalow, to 30,000 head of cattle on August 8, 2016.

At the start of March 2018, TRC approved the development in full, subject to conditions.

Then in April 2018, MPC delivered written representations to TRC requesting the appeal period be suspended and a negotiated decision notice be issued in respect of a condition requiring existing roads to be upgraded.

According to documents lodged with the P & E Court, MPC and TRC were in negotiations over the road upgrade condition between April 2018 and November 5, 2020.

In its appeal, lodged on November 13, MPC is asking for its development to be approved, with the road upgrade requirement removed from the conditions of approval.

MPC is arguing that the requirement to upgrade the roads to a bitumen seal contravenes the Sustainable Planning Act because the “infrastructure development already exists” and that the two roads named for upgrading do not “connect the premises to external infrastructure networks”.

The condition also fails to state when the infrastructure must be provided, the appeal said.

The appeal also noted MPC already had an infrastructure agreement dated October 2014 for the Whaka Feedlot and its sister feedlot to the west that saw quarterly fees paid to the then Rosalie Shire Council for road maintenance.

MPC is arguing that once developed, the traffic generated by the proposed development and the use of the infrastructure by such traffic “will not be in excess of 100 vehicles a day, will only partially contribute to the traffic used by the infrastructure, and will not alone require reasonably or at all the infrastructure to be upgraded”.