USYD Camperdown-Darlington Campus Improvement Program

I support the response of RAIDD as below.
Margaret Walters
45 Ivy Street,
Darlington NSW 2008

Application No: SSD 13_6123

Campus Improvement Program 2014-2020 for Camperdown-Darlington

RAIDD Response to RtS for SSD6123

Date: 24 August 2014

Name: RAIDD (Residents Acting In Darlington's Defence)

Address: Darlington, NSW, 2008


SHEPHERD ST SERVICE CENTRE

We remain opposed to the proposed Service Centre on Shepherd Street. We understand the rationale behind having principal Service Centres but repeat our suggestion that a more appropriate location for it would be near the intersection of Shepherd and Cleveland Streets.
This would mean the heavy service vehicles could enter and exit from the main arterial road of Cleveland Street and would therefore be kept off residential streets.

EUCALYPT TREES

The number of trees proposed to be retained following the objections of residents to their removal is still insufficient and not acceptable. More should be done to preserve these important trees.

HEIGHT OF BUILDINGS

We repeat the submission that the University should provide a written undertaking to only use 85% of each envelope in its modified CIP and that the Department should specify a maximum of 85% utilization of the envelopes for each building in any approval.

Overall, the height, scale and density of the proposed buildings is still far too great on all suggested precincts. Not only do buildings such as those proposed create overshadowing but also mean loss of light and therefore, loss of wellbeing especially in regard to the Regiment building which is in close proximity to the housing on the corner of Darlington Rd and Golden Grove.



DARLINGTON TERRACES

We vehemently object to the University's proposal to completely infill the backyards of every heritage listed terrace house (bar 3) from 86 - 130 Darlington Road with 3 storey extensions. The University will have used almost every piece of land for building on leaving very little open space, vegetation or light which are all important to the health and wellbeing of humans.
The National Trust has given these terraces an "A" rating - "highly intact". The University should not be allowed to degrade the heritage value of these terraces which are very close to the Golden Grove.

LACK OF COMMUNICATION and CONSULTATION
In its Response to Submissions, the University has in some cases misrepresented and in others totally failed to answer the community submissions in regard to the lack of consultation about and communication in regard to the CIP.
The community submissions were about the fact that the University had not consulted with the community about the CIP during the preparation of the Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) as it had been instructed to do by the Director General of the Department of Planning. The University does not address this issue at all.
The University's response refers to "specific and regular email Invitations" to "community drop-in sessions" having been sent out. These were not sent out during the period that the EIS was being developed, which is when the consultation should have taken place, but were sent out well after the EIS had been finalized and only after protests from the community about the insufficient time given to respond to the wealth of documents lodged on the Department's website.

In its Response to Submissions, the University also refers to a specific email from RAIDD dated 20 March 2014, which was actually a reply from two members of RAIDD to an email from Julie Parsons, University of Sydney Project Manager, inviting them to the last "community drop-in session".

The RAIDD members replied that, due to other commitments, they themselves would not be able to attend this session and that they had not been able to attend any of the other sessions. They asserted their view that these "community drop-in sessions" did not in fact constitute the consultation as specified in the Director General's Requirements.

The University has misrepresented the RAIDD email in its response. The University says that RAIDD said in the email that they "would not be seeking alternative arrangements as offered by the University". This is not true. In the RAIDD email nothing was said about not seeking "alternative arrangements as offered". Furthermore, the email which RAIDD was replying to did not contain any such offer. The invitation to the last "community drop-in session" was extended to the wider RAIDD email list.

It is clear that the University has not done the right thing in regard to consulting and communicating with the community about the CIP. In its Response to Submissions the University has not addressed this at all and instead tries to make it appear that it is the community, the people it should have consulted in the beginning, who are being obstructive, when this is not the case at all.

FAILURE TO FOLLOW PROCESS
The point being made in the original submission about the process was that the University had not complied with the Director General's Requirements by not consulting with the community during the preparation of the Environmental Impact Statement for the CIP and that therefore the "Development Application should not be considered by the Department of Planning and Infrastructure".
The University, in its "CIP Response to Submissions" document, refers on its front page to a "State Significant Development Application" yet chooses to respond in this same document to this in part by saying that "SSD13_6123 is not a Development Application" but rather a "Concept Strategy".
One of the numerous documents lodged on the Department of Planning website by the University is one titled "SSD Completed Application Form 1.pdf". The heading to this form, which bears Greg Robinson's signature, is "State Significant Development Application". This is why it was referred to in RAIDD's original submission as a Development Application.
Even though the University says that SSD13_6123 is not an application, it then goes on to refer to it as one anyway. The Response says "The University lodged a test of adequacy of the DGR's with the DPE (formerly Department of Planning & Infrastructure) prior to officially lodging the Campus Improvement Plan application."
During the course of 2013 the University had held meetings with the local community, at RAIDD's request, in regard to the Abercrombie Precinct Development, the Abercrombie Street Student Accommodation and the Darlington Pedestrian and Bicycle Access Strategy. The University had asked people for their names at these meetings. They did not, however, ask permission for these names to be subsequently made public.
Despite this, the University went ahead anyway and listed all of these names in Appendix N of the EIS which related back to a section headed "Community Consultation".
One of the submissions from the community expressed outrage at having their name used in this section of the CIP EIS. The University's response does not address this at all and merely quotes what was said in Section 10.2 of the CIP EIS in regard to the meetings that the people in the list had attended. These meetings had nothing to do with the CIP EIS.
The clear implication of referencing these community members' names from a section of the EIS called "Community Consultation" is that the University had consulted with the community in regard to the EIS of the CIP, when this was not the case at all. The community members had no idea about the CIP when they attended those meetings.
The implication that the required community consultation had taken place was obviously conveyed successfully to the Department as the University goes on to say in its Response that "On 18 December 2013, DPE determined that the CIP satisfactorily addressed the DGRs for the purposes of public exhibition."
Clearly the Department believes that the community was consulted in the development of the EIS for the CIP when it is equally clear to the people who should have been consulted that they had not been.
The absence of any consultation with the community about the EIS for the CIP during its development is not addressed at all in the University's Response.
The University chose to ignore the Director-General's Requirements in relation to community consultation. Not only that, it then hoodwinked the Department by making it appear in the EIS that the required consultation had actually taken place.

See attached.

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yes

23 August 2014

Submission and Objection from Peter Prineas 32 Calder Road Darlington NSW 2008

To the NSW Department of Planning and Infrastructure:

Re University of Sydney Campus Improvement Program - State Significant Development 6123

Please note my continuing strong objection to the University's proposal to destroy the eucalypt grove on its Engineering car park near Shepherd St and Calder Rd and to erect a new building on the site.

About 18 years ago the University established this grove of eucalypts (believed to be tallowwoods) to soften the impact of the university buildings overlooking neighbouring residential areas in Darlington. This eucalypt grove has very significant aesthetic values and is an increasingly important refuge for native birds and other wildlife. With the green hedge along the boundary, it provides the only substantial green respite along the university's side of Shepherd Street.

Sydney University's Shepherd Street boundary with the suburb of Darlington is very unattractive and presents essentially as a "wall" of concrete, brick and asphalt broken only by the eucalypt grove on the car park. The University should soften and open up the boundary between its Engineering campus and surrounding residential areas - not destroy the only significant green element along the boundary and replace it with a three storey building.

If the University really needs more floor space on its Darlington campus it should consider other sites. It should also consider different approaches.

Other sites and different approaches are available but in its response to public submissions on its Campus Improvement Program the University failed to consider alternatives; it limited its consultant architects to a token adjustment: a minimal setback of the proposed building on the engineering car park. This could save no more than three of the 19 eucalypts growing on the site and the setback is far from sufficient to accommodate the canopies - and probably the root systems - of these few remaining trees as they approach maturity.

Also note my objection to the development of three-storey buildings for student housing on the boundary of private residences in Darlington Street. This will result in serious overshadowing and loss of amenity for those private residences.

Please acknowledge my submission.

Please also see attached letter.

Yours sincerely

Peter Prineas

Peter Prineas

see attached

Dear Mr McManus

I am attaching my response to the University of Sydney's response to initial submissions for the Campus Improvement Program (CIP).


--
Regards


William S Armour

FRIENDS OF DARLINGTON EUCALYPT GROVE

Mon 25 August 2014
To: Peter McManus NSW Department of Planning and Infrastructure
By email: < [email protected]>

Dear sir,
Re: Residents' petition objecting to Sydney University Campus Improvement Program - State Significant Development 6123 - proposed removal of eucalypt grove (tallowwoods) from the engineering precinct car park opposite Shepherd Street near Calder Road Darlington and erection of a new building on the site.

I am forwarding a copy of a petition signed by 146 residents of Darlington. The petition is addressed to the University of Sydney but this copy is forwarded to the NSW Department of Planning and Infrastructure as a submission and objection to the above proposed development.
The sponsors of the petition will be seeking a meeting with Sydney University's Vice Chancellor in order to present the petition to him personally.
The sponsors are Susannah Dale, Suzanne Haigh, Mary Hanson, Michael Iverarch, Georgia Ovenden and Peter Prineas.
Yours sincerely,

Peter Prineas
For Friends of Darlington Eucalypt Grove email contact: <[email protected]>

see attached

Submission re SSD6123 (Campus Improvement Program)
Attention Peter McManus

Dear Peter,

I have considered the proposal for this development and I subscribe entirely to the response worked out by members of RAIDD (attached). The concerns listed in this submission are very serious and the modification and suggestions made are intelligent and very reasonable. I am accutely aware of the problems highlighted, as the development of the Business School and Students Accommodation on Abercrombie St, despite minor revisions, is a complete disaster for our community. The height and bulk of the buildings does cast a shadow right across the road after 3pm in winter and form a dark wall facing our terraces. The loss of dozens of full growth trees at the corner of Codrington St is an environmental disaster and turns this location, which I chose specifically because my house was facing a beautiful park, which, I thought, would never be ripped out to be replaced by an eight story building.

The current proposal will create exactly the same problem for residents along Shepperd St, which is worse off because the street is narrower and darker due to existing high walls close to the boundary. The trees in contentions masked some of the structure and filter the light, maintaining some privacy and the residential nature of this area. The service entrance is unsuitable in the narrow Shepperd St, which should not bear additional traffic. Even the existing parking entrance could be relocated to a ramp along Cleveland St (which widens at this spot) sufficiently distant from the intersection. The solution is obvious.

The conclusion to the relentless destruction of Darlington (and other suburbs) by Sydney University that I have witnessed over the last 50 years is that the University intends to completely erase this historical suburb. In the last 30 years, the University has already destroyed around 300 homes in Darlington. This must be stopped. The NSW government and City of Sydney should not allow this to take place and ensure that the University sticks within its boundaries and not create a Berlin wall along it. If they need to double in size, they should move their expansion elsewhere or to the main campus, which has extensive open fields and parks. Darlington should not be used as a dump so that the main campus can retain its extensive vistas for a privileged few. Please ensure that Darlington can survive.

Yours sincerely,

Maurice Thibaux
374 Abercrombie St
Darlington 2008

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