Thank you to everyone who provided a submission in the public exhibtion periods last year. 43 submissions were received by Council, 40 were against and 3 were for the Proposal.

This Planning Proposal has now been finalised by the Department of Planning, Industry and Environment.

The section below provides some background information as to the process.

History of the Proposal

A full outline of the history of the Planning Proposal is provided here (from page 254), reported to Council on 15 September 2020.

The site has been the subject of two previous Planning Proposals, the first of which was withdrawn (PP-1/2017). The second was not supported by Council and was not supported by the Sydney Eastern City Planning Panel.

During the Rezoning Review process of the second Proposal (PP-1/2018) in December 2018, Council defended the appropriateness of the existing planning controls for the area, for the following reasons:

• any increase in height or FSR on the site would be detrimental to the character of the streetscapes of Bronte Road and Birrell Street,
• the proposed controls would result in an overdevelopment of the site and damage the integrity of the heritage item
• the proposal did not meet Aim 2(d) of the Waverley Local Environmental Plan “to provide an appropriate transition of building scale around the edge of the commercial centre to protect the amenity of surrounding residential areas”
• amenity impacts on surrounding buildings were unacceptable.

In addition, two recent Land and Environment Court cases were cited as evidence that the controls have generally been upheld in this area and should continue to be upheld.

Whilst the Sydney Eastern City Planning Panel in this instance did not support the Proponent’s proposal to continue to Gateway (public exhibition), the Panel did add in their advice (Attachment 4) that:

‘if the Department’s delegate considers that a Planning Proposal changing the zoning of the site to B4 Mixed Use has merit, the Panel would recommend the adoption of a height limit that would be achieved by the continuation of the existing parapet line of the Telephone Exchange and a FSR which would be appropriate for a building that continues that line (and is probably five storeys high).

The basis for the Panel’s view is that a building of that height already exists adjoining the site and also that the Telephone Exchange is such an uncharacteristic built form that the more it can be obscured and ideally integrated into any development of the subject site, the better for the visual environment around the site. The Panel takes this view on the basis that the heritage item be restored to the 1926 built form which incorporated a door on the corner’.

On 15 February 2019, the subject Planning Proposal (PP-1/2019) was lodged with Council. The Planning Proposal is in keeping with the advice of the Panel and was again the subject of a Rezoning Review as Council did not express support to progress the Proposal. The Panel supported the Proposal and recommended that it proceed to Gateway (public exhibition). This advice is included in Agenda of the Council report attached.

Plan Making Process

Council was offered the opportunity to accept the role of planning proposal authority (PPA), which requires that Council prepare a finalised Planning Proposal to submit to the Department of Planning, Industry and Environment (DPIE) for a Gateway determination. Once the Gateway determination is received, Council acting as the PPA then undertakes the public exhibition of the proposal and reports the results back to the DPIE for their final assessment.

The role of PPA is different to the role of plan making authority (PMA). The role of the PMA is to undertake the post-Gateway assessment and determination of the proposal, and to make the final local environmental plan. The role of PMA was not given to Council in this instance, as Council had previously not supported the Planning Proposal and it was the subject of a Rezoning Review.

As such, Council was not able to make the final determination for this proposal. In response to the submissions that were provided to the Department and concerns raised by Council, the Department did reduce the FSR of the proposal from 4:1 to 3.6:1.

Further information provided by the Department on this matter is available at this website: https://www.planningportal.nsw.gov.au/ppr/lep-decision/122-bronte-road-bondi-juction

On 26 March 2021, Amendment 21 was Gazetted on the NSW Legislation website, meaning that the Proposal has now been finalised as follows:

• Rezone the site from SP2 Infrastructure (Telecommunications) to B4 Mixed Use
• Increase the FSR from 2:1 to 3.6:1
• Increase the Height of Building from 15m to 18.5m
• Heritage – the site remains a heritage item
• Inclusion on the Active Street Frontages map
• Inclusion on the Key Sites Map to apply clauses 6.9 and 6.12