THE Town of Cambridge council has set its sights on incremental infill in the course of a local planning and housing strategy. 

 

Following the  withdrawal of Amendment 31, which would have allowed dual sets of two-story dwellings to be built on properties in City beach and Floreat, the Town of Cambridge council began engaging consultants to progress a local planning scheme. 

 

This scheme aims to respond to the need to provide better opportunities for increased infill and housing diversity within the Cambridge area.

 

Town of Cambridge mayor Keri Shannon said incremental infill had the potential to bring a slight diversity of housing to the suburbs of City Beach and Floreat.  

 

Ms Shannon said the process would take longer than expected, however placing a necessary “good greenbelt” around the developments would deliver much better results to the community. 

 

“If we expand the ancillary dwelling and put better design controls in place then that’s kinda how we hope to sort of do that incremental infill within the suburbs,” she said. 

 

“I hope that [the community] would basically come on board and see that what we are trying to do is maintain the suburb, but also deliver some more vibrancy.”

 

The Town has planned to put in place a new amendment once this scheme is complete.

 

Coast Ward Ratepayers Association president Rob Walker said increases in density must logically depend on the availability of relevant infrastructure and locational circumstances. 

 

Mr Walker said the single residential character should be retained to cater for those seeking a large family based and suburban lifestyle.

 

“Any proposal put forward for City Beach and Floreat needs to recognise the locational context and the need to create opportunity for some balanced housing diversity compatible with the single residential character,” he said. 

 

“This is the role of the Town Local Planning Strategy which is being undertaken over the coming months and it appears there are attempts to have real and proper engagement with the community following the A31 debacle.”

 

City Beach resident Deanne Scott said by having those design controls put in place it could possibly fabricate “aesthetically pleasing” small-scaled infill.  

 

“I really believe that a suburb has to have a lot of trees, because research has found that if you cut down all the trees or a lot of the trees you increase the suburban temperature by eight per cent,” she said. 

 

“And so with infill if you have that massive infill program same as in Scarborough you know you take all of the trees out and there is not a blade of grass anywhere, it just heats up the whole place and makes it unliveable.”