Court Ruling Paves Way for South Sydney Residential Buildings

Sydney-based Urban Property Group has won an appeal to the New South Wales Land and Environment Court, paving the way for three low-rise residential buildings on more than a hectare of bushland along southern Sydney’s eastern beaches.

The court held five conciliation conferences between the family-run developer and Randwick City Council before upholding the appeal and approving the application to develop 11,610sq m at 11-27 Jennifer Street in Little Bay, about 15km south of Sydney’s centre.

Jennifer Street Developments Pty Ltd—a vehicle of Urban Property—filed amended plans before the LEC in August, to which Randwick council agreed.

In releasing her decision last week, court commissioner Shona Porter said the amendments were in “relation to building articulation, presentation and access to Jennifer Street, apartment layouts, landscaping, stormwater, and substation location.”

The ruling allows Urban Property to develop three residential buildings of up to four storeys with a mix of 75 one, two and three-bedroom apartments, and shared basement parking for 117 vehicles.

The decision also allows for the partial removal of native vegetation from the site, however, the developers must retain a swathe of Eastern Suburbs Banksia Scrub vegetation within the southern part of the site.

This had been a key concern of the council, which wrote on its website in October last year: “While the amended proposal has addressed the majority of the planning and urban design contentions, the unacceptable impact to biodiversity including threatened species, the significant heritage impact to the surrounding heritage items and heritage conservation areas and public interest, remain the primary contentions for council”.

▲ The bushland development site at 11-27 Jennifer Street in Little Bay, about 15km south of Sydney.

Eastern Suburbs Banksia Scrub (ESBS) once grew in an almost uninterrupted band of about 5300ha near Sydney’s coastal perimeter.  Today it can still be found in Botany, Randwick, Waverley and Manly municipalities, but is considered critically endangered.

Threatened fauna species—the little bent-winged bat and large bent-winged bat—are also found in the area.

The LEC also upheld a Clause 4.6 Variation request, allowing the developers to build up to 14.85m, or about 5.35m higher than Randwick’s development controls.

Commissioner Porter wrote she was satisfied the request justified the contravention and that the proposed development was in the public interest.

“The development maximises landscaping areas and decreased site coverage to conserve the ESBS endangered ecological community, which has created the breach by pushing the building higher,” Porter said.

“The breach is consistent with the objective to not adversely impact on neighbouring properties with respect to visual bulk, privacy, overshadowing and views, as these impacts are from the compliant built form and not the breaches.”

Porter ordered the developers to pay Randwick council’s legal costs of about $6000.