More trees to be removed from old TAFE site – Silica Road Carine

Peaceful protest blocked Stimes 12 July 2016 pg 3

                                                                          

Carine residents are angry about tree removal due to an inadequate setback allowance from the street and not enough public consultation for this $40M development in a residential area.  See Article by Kate Leaver in the Stirling Times, 12 July 2016 on page 3.  

Having the development right up to the road in a residential area with houses and verges is going to look awful and the there will be no room for street trees which the City of Stirling are spending a lot of money promoting for our health and wellbeing?

This is an image from the plans on the City of Stirling website;

Plans - 29 Silica Road Carine (City of Stirling website)

                                                                          Plans – 29 Silica Road Carine (City of Stirling website)

This image shows the “9” trees that will be removed along the road.  This ridiculous the trees are right along the road, the issue here is about setbacks!

We must demand that adequate setbacks are allowed to preserve or plant canopy trees and allow for landscaping.

What can you do to help stop this madness?

You can write to Councillors and Executives at the City of Stirling  to Carine MP Tony Krsticevic, see contact details here .  Most importantly write to Opal Aged Care .  Also comment under the article in the Stirling Times and share it on social media, you could also write a letter to the editor.  If people don’t saying thing, they assume it is not an issue.

We need the City of Stirling and other councils and local MPs to stand up to the State Government and force them to change their dodgy new planning laws (see below).

Background information

Trees along Silica Road to be removed

                                                                   Trees along Silica Road to be removed due to lack of setback

Flats on Hay St in W.Perth

Flats on Main Street in Tuart Hill

Flats on Main Street in Tuart Hill

Flats on Onslow Rd in Shenton Park

Flats on Onslow Rd in Shenton Park

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Above are images of how apartment developments were designed in the past. Notice how the trees also screen the buildings so they are not so obtrusive and the trees shade the buildings and streets.  Room needs to be left for trees and landscaping, increasing urban heat is a serious public health issue, we can no longer  allow mature trees like these to be removed.  The City of Stirling  and the State Government have a duty to protect citizens and amenity, not to maximise developers profits.  We can have density and development, but it has to be done well.

About this development site

The residents in this precinct have had a rough time, the image below shows the old Carine TAFE before it was bulldozed complete with its new tax payer funded library.  Seeing all of the trees and vegetation bulldozed was very distressing for residents.

More trees were removed from the site than expected and the amount of fill brought in to elevate the site was staggering.  Residents where unhappy enough at the proposed building heights, but did not realise that the ground levels were going to go up too, with massive retaining walls.

This approach of completely clearing and flattening development sites is some times referred to as “scorched Earth” or  “Tabula Rasa”.   Seeing this development unfold prompted me to write a story about it and others going on in Carine and Gwelup, see Tabula Rasa – part 1 Carine Rise.

The State Government sold off this publicly owned land and asset to developers, through some LandCorp deal (no one knows ever really knows how much developers pay for the land, there is virtually no transparency?), it is called Carine Rise.

Cedar Woods, the publicly listed corporate developer got a big chuck of it and construction of the their Western section along Marmion Avenue appears to be almost finished.  For your information Cedar Woods are the developers who look like getting hold of the  iconic publicly land in Point Peron (one of Mark McGowan’s pet projects).

The development was originally called “Carine Vision” origionally.  See the images below, the  image on the right below is an old Google Earth image of the Carine TAFE site before demolition and the image on the left is on page 5 of the   Carine Vision Local Structure Plan from 2012  from the City of Stirling website (search ‘Silica Road Carine’ for more).

Notice that the development does show a set back along Silica Road in the left hand image? This is typical, across Perth plans go back behind closed doors after public consultation and end up with some times significant changes.  This is a classic example.  Members of the public look at the plans and think they are okay and don’t bother fighting them and then they mysteriously change.

Slide2

                                                                                                                Page 2, Tabula Rasa – Part 1 Carine Rise, by Leisha Jack

 

This is what we are seeing all over Perth, the State Government has created planning laws and approval processes such as DAPs that allow developers to build right up to the road, leaving little room for trees and landscaping.  They have removed Local Government planning powers.   Local Governments can now only make recommendations to the WAPC.  If something is allowed in State Planning law then there is nothing anyone can do to stop them.  Barnett has given dictatorial powers to the Planning Minister and they can now do anything they want, anywhere they like, even on public land.

There are residents groups like this one all over Perth who are joining forces and calling for a Royal Commission into State planning processes,  see the #ScraptheDAP campaign.

If you are interested in the history of how State planning laws have slowly been changed by both Liberals and Labor over the decades, read this very interesting paper by WA planning lawyer Denis McLeod, which he presented to a Local Government forum warning about Barnett’s Development Assessment Panels just before they were introduced.

See a flyer that was produced by the resident group;

SOT carine

 

 

2 thoughts on “More trees to be removed from old TAFE site – Silica Road Carine

  1. This developers going crazy! How can it be stopped. They have their people in the Council. What about the thriller C ! Jessie Duffill

    Sent from my iPhone

    • The first thing you have to understand is that the State Government have removed Local Governments planning powers. The State Government makes the planning rules and Local Governments have to allow them. All the council can do is make recommendations which are typically ignored by the WAPC. There are some pro-developer Councillors and staff at the City of Stirling for sure. But most are very frustrated by the situation too. Read the blog post again, I have updated it.

      “You can write to Councillors and Executives at the City of Stirling to Carine MP Tony Krsticevic, see contact details here . Most importantly write to Opal Aged Care . Also comment under the article in the Stirling Times and share it on social media, you could also write a letter to the editor. If people don’t saying thing, they assume it is not an issue.”

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