A couple of years ago, I wrote about the Electronic Housing Code (EHC) and the role it played in enabling users to determine whether they needed planning permission to build or renovate, and also, when appropriate, to prepare, submit and lodge a complying development application. This system was superseded a few months ago by the new NSW Department of Planning & Environment Planning Portal.
Like the original EHC, the new Planning Portal provides public access to information, online services and guidance materials relating to the NSW planning system. The Portal has been designed to address the needs of NSW councils, industry professionals and the general community, in an ongoing effort to improve access to planning information.
Access to the new Planning Portal is open—registration is no longer required—and users can search planning information on any property in NSW, including the maps and applicable clauses associated with the relevant LEP. It also includes a range of background information to help users to efficiently navigate the NSW planning system. The map viewer is particularly useful, providing access to recent imagery with the ability to overlay the complete range of LEP map data for quick identification of the applicable LEP clauses.
The Portal also provides a single point of access for DA tracking throughout NSW. In this case, DA status information is ultimately provided through individual council websites, but there is no longer any need to know how to navigate through [the invariably different routes on] individual council websites to find this information. As well as the status and progress of individual DAs, the tracking system provides the ability to query the status of any DA in a nominated area, either at the locality or individual street/road level.
Note that development in the former Palerang and Queanbeyan City areas will continue to be controlled by their respective LEPs for the foreseeable future. It is, nonetheless, expected that LEP consolidation will be completed in the 2018-2019 timeframe, in the term of the new and soon to be elected Council.
Pete Harrison ~ The QPR Blog cross-reference
30 October 2017 @ 14:03
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