Town planning

Town Planning Consultants Melbourne

Large areas of Melbourne are now covered by a council overlay of some description. Overlays can be enacted to protect the general look or theme of an area (heritage overlays), to preserve trees (vegetation overlays) or to limit the floor level of buildings (flooding overlays). In addition, work on all sites less than 300 square metres (or in some council areas 500 square metres) require town planning permission. Occasionally a site may have a combination of overlays that will all need to be considered during the design stage.

The existence of an overlay doesn’t prevent development; it simply means that certain design requirements must be addressed when drafting the project.

What’s important is that drafting and design are undertaken by an experienced professional who understands the various overlay restrictions and can provide the specific documentation required to council. Failure to address the requirements of an overlay can result in very long delays during the approval process.

Drafting Edge has a strong track record in designing extensions that adhere to local overlay requirements without compromising the original vision for the project.

Dispensations

There are twenty-three regulations that govern how a building must be positioned on a site – things like ‘overshadowing’, wall-heights and front and side setbacks. Sometimes, the nature of the site makes it impossible to meet all twenty-three regulations. It could be an unusual sloping block, for example, or specific spatial or visual requirement such as a high fence or a carport forward of the house.

If your requirements don’t meet the regulations we can prepare an application to council to vary the regulations to allow the project to proceed.

Building permits

All structural work requires a building permit. To get one, you’ll need a complete set of construction plans, reports and forms. All Drafting Edge plans come with a building surveyor guarantee – our assurance that your plans will be suitable for a permit to be issued.

Other Consultant services

Every application for building approval requires comprehensive architectural plans, certified structural engineering, a soil report with footing recommendations and an energy report. Additional plans and reports may be required, depending on the job.

We use the most reputable and experienced consultants for all external consultancy requirements. We’ve worked with each of them on multiple projects over many years and consider them an extension of our own team.