This article in SMH House & Home - Life & Style Home - smh.com.au Bears out so many experiences with Councils that I have had and also it is what my daughter, an architect, always advises her clients that they can expect from Councils when they start out with hopes of "We hope to finish by Christmas" or similar. As to the cost of going to land & Environment Court it was similar when I built a tennis Court. Very influential neighbours protested despite ALL owning tennis Courts themselsves. Council refusal caused delays so that costs of actually buiding skyrocketed and we incurred further losses as we were going to sell and the market passed its peak before we had finished. I prepared all the docs myself for L& I court without a solicitor(mY home grown lawyer was at the timeonly in High school!!)and at a subsequent site meeting of us and Council officer and L& I Court officer, she strongly advised council to approve the Court otherwise L& I Court would take a v dim view of Council. I wish I had known what I do now to submit to L& I court after 40 days without waiting for the argle bargle,delaying from Councils. In fact I believe some builders put in application to Court at same time as they submit to Councils. However ,on the other hand my experience with Woolhara Council a couple of years ago was fine-- Submitted and was ready to charge straight to Court- Had one objection which after on site demonstration to objecting neighbour was resolved amicably Council passed a huge redevelopment of a PPo R Different climate in Council now- they are M***ls)-- So to Ryde Council-- passed smaller -- But here I had my wonderful home grown architect to prepare an EIS so no probs-- Sometimes just who is in Council at the time but it is criminal the way they can waste ratepayers money with their inefficiency
Hi Balboa I know where you're coming from and it can be very frustrating- just even getting the right information is painful and time consuming! Interested to know, however, if you don't mind sharing, what your neighbours protests were based on in regards to the tennis court construction. What on earth could they say when they all had their own? I'm curious.....!!
As I mentioned the neighbours were "influential" or so they thought in their own milieau. Not so when it came to actual Law. -- Local businessmen- knew aldermen in same clubs etc. Also one neighbour's house was on the national trust list so she had N .T correspond to Council on her behalf. N.T did not inspect the Site . The main objection seemed to be the T.C required the removal of 2 trees.privacy. We were not privy to all the correspondence. Each of the neighbours', including our own garden contained many trees so that the T.C would still have been obscured from neibouring properties and would not have impacted on any properties. One of the neighbours Courts was in fact at the front of their house and could be seen from to street and ours was at rear of our garden screened by trees and gardens. Council just piked out and thought ,no doubt because we went through straight channels without speaking to "mates'' that we would fall over and abide by their decision.That there was no substance to their objections was borne out by the L&E assessor when we had the meeting on Site with Council. We had prepared boards with photos and references to other T.C's all over the District to argue our case and she did not even look at them. She looked at the Site and said it was "ideal for aT.C" Case won.
