Planning Regulation 2017 amendment

The Queensland Government has amended the Planning Regulation 2017 to enable a material change of use on contaminated land to be assessable development.

Before this change, the Planning Regulation 2017 prohibited applications of this type until such time as the contamination had been remediated.   

The previous rules under the Sustainable Planning Act allowed an application to be lodged and assessed without need to carry out expensive rehabilitation works.

Under the change, development will still not be able to commence until the rehabilitation works have occurred, but it means that this expense can be undertaken following a development approval.

The amendments also correct an error in the koala regulatory regime relating to the definition of ‘urban activity’, which was introduced in August to support the South East Queensland Regional Plan 2017.

The updated version of the Planning Regulation 2017 can be found here.