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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2002 Week 9 Hansard (20 August) . . Page.. 2478 ..

MR CORBELL (continuing):

Suburban areas-this applies to most of Canberra's suburbs and all of its heritage areas-will have new controls put in place. Suburban areas are those areas located in a section wholly outside of 200 metres from a local or group centre, or 300 metres from a town centre in Civic itself. In these areas there will be no triple occupancy or multi-unit development. Dual occupancy development will still be permitted, but there will be no unit titling for the additional dwelling. In addition, the variation puts in place new controls for development.

The focus on these is on provision of private open space, direct sunlight access, better solar access provisions, and privacy for residents. This responds directly to the concerns that have been raised in our community about overshadowing, loss of sunlight and loss of privacy because of redevelopment.

The current provisions-just to outline what the previous government left us with-include a performance measure, specifying a minimum area of private open space to be 35 per cent of the block, for blocks up to 450 square metres, and 40 per cent of the block for blocks over 450 square metres. The garden city variation introduces a formula which significantly increases these minimum amounts. That is an immediate response to the issues being raised by the community.

For example, a block of 400 square metres will require 50 per cent private open space, an 800-square-metre block will require 60 per cent private open space, and a 1,200-square-metre block will require over 63 per cent private open space. There are also provisions dealing with providing for greater sunlight access and more privacy. For example, there are new overshadowing provisions which ensure that, in these residential areas, overshadowing can be no greater than that cast by a two-metre high fence on the northern boundary in mid-winter. So that is a very significant change that protects solar access rights. It is another of the government's key election commitments to legislate and protect solar access for residents, to legislate and provide for greater private open space and greater planting areas for trees and gardens-those qualities that we value about our city.

The government recognises, though, that we need to provide for the continuing change in evolution of our suburbs. So both within the suburban areas and in the general areas, under the residential land use policy, there is provision for this to occur. In the general areas, dual and triple occupancy development and multi-unit development is still permitted, although new controls are in place to provide for privacy and prevent overshadowing-the range of issues I have just addressed.

These general areas are focused to allow for redevelopment activity to occur in greater intensity close to services and facilities where people live. One of the main complaints about redevelopment of Canberra's existing suburbs has been that it has occurred in a scattergun way, using an ad hoc approach, which does nothing to improve the sustainability of our city and does nothing to encourage greater use of non-car modes of transport, and does nothing to give greater access to services and facilities.

So the general areas of land use policy proposed under residential policies means that high-density development occurs close to shops, and local services and facilities that people need and use. It allows people who live in a smaller dwelling to be close to the shops. They are able to walk to the shops and, because they are on a major public

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