Special place for NAC

There doesn’t appear to be a stated subject. I’ll assume your goal is rezoning nonurban land to residential and the building of approximately 3,000 residential tenancies.

To take your commentary seriously, please clarify the following.

Any perceived “injustice” would appear to reflect Commercial wrong doings to the detriment of unsophisticated (or naïve) investors.
Please provide ANY relevant material where either Local or State Government have promised nonurban blocks would be rezoned.

Can you please provide your “evidence” that the area is not genuine “Australian bushland”? That seems an extraordinary claim.
Have you actually investigated the local flora? Have you liaised with Landcare Australia or any government body in relation to this?

VACANT, undeveloped Council properties valued at $250,000 each?
Many are less than 400m2, many suffer horrendously from Highway Noise, many are situated on sites that would require total destruction of the environment to develop.
Please provide the basis of your land valuations.

Please provide suitable documentation that “infrastructure could be delivered for less than $50,000 per lot”, which, from your research (DESIM, Stantec, Alluvium, Flow Systems), you must be in possession of.

Please provide your estimate for the costs of “roads” which of course needs to be incorporated. Stormwater? It seems mischievous that such expenditure is ignored in your $200M profit projection for Council.

On what basis could a $250,000 block of land (many less than 400 m2) provide “affordable housing”? What impact would a third of the township needing “affordable housing” have in terms of Social Welfare?

What “employment” is projected and what opportunity does this offer “young population”?

Please expand on the following:
“ · Innovation
· Sustainable and affordable services for communities
· Creating resilient, selfsufficient community”
Is this a reference that some Services (water, sewer, power) can be internally funded and maintained privately, without any level of Government provision?
“Self-sufficiency” exceeds those Services so the use of that term is misleading and deceptive.

“State and Federal government programs invest in sustainable infrastructure and smart communities”
(Well there goes any self-sufficiency.)
What programs have been considered and approved?
Please provide accurate details of these government investments as a critical aspect relating to Land Owners further expenditure.

“This kind of development would be fully aligned with Hunter Region’s vision to create a "leading regional economy in Australia".”
3,000 houses (1,000 “affordable housing”) attempting to be self sufficient with no inherent industry? Please explain the basis of how this could be “a leading regional economy in Australia". It would appear to be a Social Welfare disaster waiting to happen.

“World will be different after COVID-19, we can make it better together for the benefit of all.”
Please provide the relevance to Covid-19.

The commentary you provided appears to be an extension of the scams previously perpetuated. Inaccurate and attempting to provide false hope to both current and prospective land owners. 

Buyers Beware.

A few observations on this article to add to Grant’s.                

Plans for URBAN DEVELOPMENT were approved by then Stroud Shire Council in May of 1918 and first lots were sold exactly 100 years ago.

The first house blocks that were sold 100 years ago do not appear on that 1918 Burley Griffin plan but on Halloran’s later plan. (These blocks now form a significant part of the North Arm Cove village.)

It is a long standing issue of injustice, … (long paragraph follows)

This whole paragraph is just plain wrong. Everybody who has bought land since the early 1960s must have been aware that they were buying land with no building entitlement.

Unfortunately over the years there have been several false prophets raising hopes. Mostly these were developers. Don Fox was one. He visited the Cove in November 1992 and assured 120 non-urban land owners that his company was going to rezone the land. The costs he said would be $38000 a block. Every owner would be obliged to pay. Those that could not, might forfeit their land he said. But neither Council nor Government were interested in developing the area because, for them, development elsewhere was easier and cheaper. I doubt that much has changed.

Environmental issues are overstateted and not supported by evidence – area is not genuine “Australian bushland” –

This is nonsense too, Dejan. Your heroes, Walter and Marion, clearly had an opinion quite the opposite to yours. Get yourself to the National Library and check out the photos they took when they were here in 1918.

Australian bush regenerates – after fires and after clearing. It has been doing so for millenia. Seed banks remain in the soil ready to germinate when the conditions are right.

Land Ltd, the company associated with the Burley Griffins, knew about regeneration too. When director Samuel Emmett sought permission to sell in November 1918, he argued against them being required to clear all the roads at once because, he told Council, “in a few years it would all be a forest again”.

Look at the 1963 aerial image on the back cover of the NAC book. You will see the clear signs of regeneration occurring on all those bush tracks that were not being regularly traversed.

– it has been regularly cleared of native vegetation for almost two centuries (From the history of The Australian Agricultural Company):

This is not really correct either and not supported by your quote. After the failure of the cotton crops at Baromee Point in 1927-29, the AACo had little interest in the Baromee Peninsula because they realised the soil was too poor for agriculture. The Gooreenggai continued to make traditional use of the area. In the 1850s AACo did have a track that ran from Carrington to their coal depot at Shippers Point. In 1856 they briefly considered creating a subdivision over the area. Seventy-eight years after they came, they sold the land in 1904. In the 20th century, developers have cleared tracks and lots when they were trying to sell. The Army cleared some areas for manoeuvres. Most of the cleared land successfully regenerated. Despite some exotics, our bush is still “genuine“ Australian bush because it provides a habitat for a wide range of Australian flora and fauna, some of which are designated endangered.