Fears for wetlands and traffic conditions in proposed Wellard housing development

The City of Kwinana wants to know the lay of the land before it will support a plan that will create more than 450 homes.

Urbis, acting on behalf of Woolcoot Development Pty Ltd, has lodged a local structure plan with the city for its backing.

The plan covers nearly 40ha across three lots on Millar Road and Woolcoot Road in Wellard, which it proposes developing into about 460 dwellings and a commercial centre with about 1500sqm of retail floor space.

But councillors voted at their June 24 meeting not to support the plan because it did not have enough details about the wetlands the development would affect.

The area covered by the plan includes two resource enhancement wetlands.

The Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions determines the extent of wetlands by aerial imagery, which is then refined by on-the-ground mapping.

The applicants believe the wetlands are smaller and have a different shape than that shown in the DBCA’s mapping. They want their plan assessed at the same time as the wetlands are reviewed.

A city report said this was “highly problematic” as its assessment was based on accurately knowing what was at the site.

“The extent of the wetlands affects lot yield, local water management, tree retention, public open space design, road layout and bushfire management, zoning and density codes,” it said.

“All of which are the basic elements that need to be clearly defined in a structure plan for it to be effective in guiding land subdivision and development.”

There were also concerns about the proposed buffers around the wetlands and the bushfire management plan, which included the city taking on reducing the fuel load and providing hard surface limestone areas.

Director of city development and sustainability Greg Bowering said the applicant had “gone to some trouble” to work out how the wetlands should be handled.

“Our position is that may be the outcome but we can’t take that on face value,” he said.

“There’s a number of unknowns for us, and by having those still in the unknown category, we can’t be confident about the outcome of the structure plan.”

The council agreed, voting unanimously to recommend telling the WA Planning Commission it did not support the proposed plan.

“I think approving before the DBCA has finalised wetland mapping, we’d be putting the cart before the horse,” Cr David Acker said.

The city received 18 submissions when it advertised the plan for comment.

Wellard resident Moira Nell said at the council meeting the development was expected to add more than 5000 vehicle movements per day, and asked if all necessary road upgrades would be completed before work started on the housing.

“People are leaving the freeway to come through those rural roads to try and skip a bit of the traffic,” she said.

“We’ve had a lot of congestion sometimes, adding 20-30 minutes on a journey into the city for work or making people late for school.”

Mr Bowering said the city was well aware drivers were seeking rat runs.

He said the structure plan envisaged roads would be operating “satisfactorily” by 2037 but the interim “could be difficult”.

“What you’re seeing is the inevitable result of that land development process,” Mr Bowering said.

“The developers . . . they’re aware that they’ve got to deliver that new infrastructure. They build the local roads, they build the local parks, they install the lighting, they do that all to the relevant standards.

“Over a period of time . . . usually about two years, we check all of that to make sure that it meets our standards.”

Alex Campbell from Urbis told the meeting the group was disappointed with the council’s recommendation, saying Urbis had asked for concerns to be raised with it so they could be addressed.