Three SSDs: What Happens Next for Byron Bay
3 x State Significant Proposals all breaching the 11.5 metre height limit
What assessment was undertaken before the Minister declared three Byron Bay developments State Significant …
+ Where are the HDA's and Minister's assessments and
why aren’t the reasons publicly available?
That’s a good question. If you live in the 2481 postcode, you may have missed what is happening right under our noses.
Three major private housing proposals — 11 Butler Street, 148–158 Jonson Street and Luxcon at 90–96 Jonson Street — have all been taken out of the ordinary local planning pathway and into the NSW Government’s new Housing Delivery Authority (HDA) / State Significant Development (SSD) pathway.
And all within roughly 1.5 kilometers of each other, and all breach the town’s height limit of 11.5m.
The Luxcon proposal alone illustrates the scale of the change. It proposes around 110 dwellings and a height of approximately 21 metres, compared with Byron Bay’s existing 11.5-metre height control. It has been declared SSD through the NSW Government’s new Housing Delivery Authority pathway, with concurrent rezoning proposed.
Together, the three SSD proposals represent more than 300 additional dwellings and, importantly, all three have been identified for SSD with concurrent rezoning.
Add to the mix, the 200 seniors-living apartments at the Glen Villa caravan park (Oasis), and more than 500 new dwellings/apartments are proposed through State-influenced planning pathways within a relatively small area of Byron Bay.
Different pathways. Different decision-makers. One town.
Byron Bay has spent decades developing strategic planning frameworks that balance growth with its landscape, village character and built environment. That careful balance is now at stake.
Byron Bay deserves to know what is being changed, who is making those decisions — and what we stand to lose.
MORE QUESTIONS THAN ANSWERS
What we want to know is: where is the assessment of what this means for Byron Bay?
In particular, where was the cumulative impact of these projects on Byron Bay’s character, tourism economy, infrastructure, height and density, local planning framework and community expectations considered before State intervention was approved?
The Housing Delivery Authority (HDA) assesses proposals against its own SSD criteria and recommends to the Minister whether they should be declared State Significant Development.
NSW Planning describes the HDA briefing record as setting out the HDA’s recommendations and reasons to the Minister. The Minister then makes the formal declaration.
Where was Byron Bay’s established local planning framework, low-rise scale and distinctive character considered? Where were community expectations considered?
And where is the Minister’s reasoning for determining that these projects warrant State intervention available for the community to see?
The issue isn't whether Byron Bay should have housing. Of course it should.
But this is about more than three developments.
It is about how Byron Bay is planned, who makes those decisions, how transparent those decisions are, and whether the State’s new housing pathways are appropriate for a town that is promoted globally as a distinctive tourism destination.
SIGN THE PETITION HERE: https://www.change.org/p/byron-bay-our-fight-about-height
WRITE TO THE MINISTER HERE: wollongong@parliament.nsw.gov.au
JOIN THE CAMPAIGN HERE: peopleofbyron@gmail.com
Read more about height history in The Echo
“There’s an obvious contradiction here: you can’t promote Byron Bay to the world for its distinctive character, natural environment and low-rise coastal lifestyle, while allowing State-led development to progressively change those very qualities without looking at the cumulative impact.”