SoE 2006 > Human settlement > 2.7 Amenity

2.7 Amenity

While 49% of the Sydney region comprises national parks, forests and reserves, the pressures for urban consolidation and new suburban land releases make improving urban amenity a key challenge. Providing sufficient open space, and reducing odours and noise pollution remain important issues.

Community groups identified provision of adequate green space as an important issue during consultation for the Metropolitan Strategy. Apart from adding to a sense of place and providing facilities for sport, recreation and relaxation, urban green space improves amenity by acting as 'urban lungs' and reducing 'heat island' effects. It also provides habitat and wildlife corridors that help to maintain local biodiversity.

Odour and noise pollution can have negative impacts on the quality of life and health, and need to be addressed in planning and pollution control strategies. Limited data is available to report against these indicators and insufficient baseline data has been assessed to establish acceptable benchmarks for gauging whether levels are changing. Future reporting cycles are expected to include improved data.

NSW indicators

Introduction

The term 'amenity' relates to the qualities, characteristics and attributes people value about a place and which contribute to their quality of life. Urban or residential amenity encompasses a wide range of attributes and values which change over time and with cultural and socio-economic status. Accordingly, the attributes of amenity which people seek and appreciate often vary according to individual values and locations.

The amenity of urban or residential areas is provided by elements such as the physical landscape or streetscape, areas of vegetation, and public and private open space for recreation, such as parks, reserves and gardens. Other important elements of urban design include the scale and dominance of buildings, the presence of heritage places, views and outlooks, privacy, physical safety, accessibility, and levels of noise and odour.

Current status and trends

Urban green space

Green spaces and open spaces are increasingly valued features of urban centres and suburbs. They add to many people's sense of enjoyment of urban life and contribute to their health and wellbeing by providing facilities for sport, recreation and relaxation. Urban green spaces also improve amenity in other significant ways, such as providing 'urban lungs', reducing 'heat island' effects, and providing habitat and wildlife corridors that help to maintain local biodiversity.

Open spaces can include streets, plazas, civic squares and waterfronts as well as parks, sportsgrounds and reserves (DoP 2005a). These public spaces have an important role in community life: they enable public events and larger-scale social interactions, provide a sense of place, and variously contribute to the distinct character of urban streetscapes and regions.

Many green and open spaces are a result of long-term planning decisions, enacted cumulatively since colonial times, to acquire and conserve significant sites for recreation and/or environment protection.

The design of cities, including urban green space, has a direct impact on health. People are more likely to make healthy behaviour choices when their immediate environment is conducive to and supportive of them. The provision of green space in the urban environment is a key component to providing areas within our suburbs that promote a healthy environment for residents.

About 49% of the Sydney region (GMR₁, less Newcastle and Wollongong) is made up of national parks, state forests, regional parks, nature reserves and recreational areas. Key statistics about this urban green space include (DoP 2005a):

• there is more than 630,000 hectares (ha) of open space
• urban green space amounts to 31,000 ha (not including the large national parks and reserves around the Sydney region)
• 91% of Sydney people live within 800 metres (or about a 5–10 minute walk) of some kind of open space, either a local or regional park, sports field or bushland
• half of all the trips by Sydney residents on weekends are to social or recreational activities
• Centennial Park receives more than five million visitors annually
• the Domain and Royal Botanic Gardens receive over eight million visitors each year.

Noise impacts on urban amenity

Noise pollution can be defined as unwanted noise that unreasonably intrudes on daily activities. In urban areas, noise pollution has many sources, most of which is associated with urban living: road, rail and air transport; industrial noise; and neighbourhood and recreational noise. A number of factors contribute to problems of high noise levels including:

• increasing population, particularly where it involves expanding urbanisation into former rural areas, and urban consolidation with incompatible adjacent land uses
• increasing volumes of road, rail and air traffic
• planning schemes that result in noise-based land-use conflicts.

The level of annoyance or discomfort depends on the type, timing, duration and frequency of noise or if the disturbance is out of the ordinary, that is, where it differs from the 'background' noise.

The impact of noise on human health has emerged as an increasingly significant issue that justifies stronger management efforts in the future. There is now sufficient evidence internationally that community noise may pose a general public health risk, although further research is needed to assess more fully the impact of environmental noise on public health (enHealth Council 2004).

Local councils, DEC and NSW Police all receive complaints about noise. As a result, the data on complaints received by DEC in Figure 2.19 should be considered indicative only. Complaints are not regarded as an accurate measure of the impact of noise and typically understate it. For example, most European Union countries are now mapping noise in urban areas of more than 250,000 people to develop a better indicator of environmental noise levels and trends.

DEC Environment Line received 1438 noise complaints in 2004–05 (compared with 1255 in 2002–03), accounting for 15% of all incident calls about activities the agency regulates (12% in 2002–03) (Figure 2.19). In 2004–05 there were 6193 requests for information about noise issues to Environment Line or 16% of all information calls received (5819 and 15% in 2002–03).

Figure 2.19: DEC Environment Line incident calls, 2004–05

Source: DEC data for year 2004–05

Note: A total of 9696 incident calls were received by Environment Line in 2004–05 (10,629 in 2002–03 and 10,495 in 2003–04).

Odour impacts on amenity

Odours are difficult to regulate as individuals can react differently to them and they come from a large range of sources. Additionally, climatic or seasonal conditions, such as very calm weather, can worsen their impacts, even at long distances from their source.

Odour impacts often arise from inappropriate land-use decisions that allow residential areas to grow around established rural odour-generating activities or, in the reverse scenario, that site odour-generating activities close to existing residential areas. Abattoirs, piggeries, cattle feedlots, poultry farms, sewage treatment plants, landfills, charcoal chicken shops and smash repairers can cause odour problems. Conflicts resulting from planning decisions can arise as the planning processes under the Environmental Planning and Assessment Act 1979 are not properly equipped to handle this amenity issue.

Odours are the largest source of complaints to DEC Environment Line: they accounted for 33.4% of the total in 2004–05, which is approximately 75% of the total of 4316 air pollution complaints made (compared with 80% and 4248 in 2002–03). The majority of complaints about odour are generally from areas on the urban–rural interface and from regional centres outside Sydney.

Local councils are believed to receive the most complaints about odour, but a consolidation of data on the number of complaints they process is not available. The data trends on complaints received only by DEC should therefore be considered indicative only.

Response to the issue

Land-use planning

Enhancing and maintaining green space

The Local Government Act 1993 requires local councils to classify their open-space lands and develop management plans with the community for their ongoing use and maintenance. Community land must be re-classified by councils to operational land before it can be sold or used for any other purpose.

The NSW Government administers funding programs to enhance access to, and improve the quality of, Sydney's green space. Projects funded under these programs help restore, conserve or enhance land in public ownership to provide accessible places with facilities for recreational pursuits through partnerships between State and local government and the community. Relevant NSW Government funding programs include the Metropolitan Greenspace Program, Cooks River Foreshore Improvement Program and Sharing Sydney Harbour Access Program, a partnership between the Waterways Authority and Sydney Harbour Foreshore Authority.

The Greenspace program allocates grants in the Sydney metropolitan region to help plan and improve regionally significant open space. The program enables more effective use of these areas by communities and promotes benefits for recreation, conservation and heritage.

The NSW Government has been acquiring and conserving land for recreation and the environment as part of a long-term plan in Western Sydney for over 30 years. Launched in 2004, the Western Sydney Parklands is transforming 5500 ha of old farming paddocks to create new recreation areas and regenerated natural bushland (DoP 2005a).

Amendments to the Environment Planning and Assessment Act 1979 are allowing section 94 development levies to be used for the acquisition and embellishment of open space.

Preventing noise and odour impacts

Noise and/or odour problems can often be prevented or minimised by avoiding the location of sensitive land uses, such as residential areas, schools, hospitals, nursing homes or places of worship, near noisy or odour-generating premises. Land-use planning processes and careful site selection play critical roles in avoiding conflict between neighbouring land uses. In cases where inappropriate land-use decisions have caused noise or odour in residential and other sensitive areas, it is often difficult to find an agreeable compromise between the residents' rights to amenity and industries' pre-existing rights to operate under planning laws. Controls to minimise odour, noise and other emissions from industrial premises can be used, but this does not often remedy poor planning decisions. The draft policy on Assessment and Management of Odour from Stationary Sources provides for negotiated agreements between an affected community and an existing facility, that may -provide a suitable compromise (EPA 2001). This policy also has advice for councils on how to avoid land-use conflicts and information for property owners on implementing best management practices to minimise noise impacts.

Some councils have addressed noise issues in their local environmental plans and have development control plans that provide acceptable noise criteria. Councils can also implement noise control measures as part of the development approval for subdivisions and individual developments, and may include specific conditions of consent or design options to address noise issues.

The following NSW Government publications provide guidance to regulators and industry about land-use planning principles that can result in better residential environments and the avoidance of land-use conflicts:

• Environmental Criteria for Road Traffic Noise (EPA 1999)
• NSW Industrial Noise Policy (EPA 2000)
• Assessing Vibration: A Technical Guideline (DEC 2006e)
• Noise Guide for Local Government (DEC 2004c).

DEC has drafted a guideline on environmental criteria for rail noise, intended to inform the development of a whole-of-government rail noise policy. A construction noise guideline aimed at improving noise control on construction sites through the employment of better work practices is also under development.

A number of brochures are available from DEC for dealing with neighbourhood noise, barking dogs and noise from vehicles and intruder alarms, and how to seek noise abatement orders. Videos on managing neighbourhood noise and rural noise are also available.

Some NSW councils have drafted local noise policies or guidelines which take into account local preferences and community expectations.

Legislative framework for noise and odour control

Managing noise impacts

In NSW, the Protection of the Environment Operations Act 1997, Protection of the Environment Operations Amendment Act 2005 and the Protection of the Environment Operations (Noise Control) Regulation 2000 provide the legal framework and basis for managing unacceptable noise. No single Government authority has the responsibility or capacity to manage all forms of noise pollution. Table 2.6 shows the responsible enforcement authorities for various types of noise in NSW.

Table 2.6: Government agency responsibilities for noise issues in NSW

Managing odour impacts

Government has responsibility for licensed activities and activities owned and operated by the State or a public authority. Any Government-licensed activity may be required to meet conditions designed to prevent or minimise odour. Government encourages industry to become involved with the local community to resolve odour problems and requires many facilities to maintain their own registers of odour complaints. Local councils are responsible for non-EPA licensed sources and the Local Government Act 1993 contains provisions for public nuisance under which local government can take action against odours.

Future directions

The Sydney Open Space Inventory provides a spatial database on regional and local government open space. This should enable tracking of trends in the extent and management of important green space assets. Maintenance of existing green space becomes increasingly important as gardens are lost to urban consolidation.

Baseline data and agreed assessment and predictive models are needed to assist planners and compliance officers to deal effectively with noise and odour problems.

State and local governments will need to coordinate strategies to ensure that land-use compatibility is considered in all future planning processes to prevent generating new sources of noise and odour that have an adverse impact on public health and amenity. Where development proposals have already been granted to locate residential areas and industry close to one another, careful siting of less sensitive land uses, such as commercial developments next to major noise sources and the establishment of buffer zones, can help minimise conflicts and retain amenity.

A major objective of the Metropolitan Strategy is to minimise household exposure to unacceptable noise levels. Planning for new developments will aim to avoid noise-related land-use conflicts through initial planning, with appropriate separation distances for incompatible land uses. Urban renewal should be located and designed to minimise noise impacts on residents, while recognising the benefits of concentrating housing around transport nodes or corridors. The planning of new release areas should consider existing adjoining land uses such as small farm holdings. Modelling of noise and odour within metropolitan areas would assist this process.

Government is funding a study of best practice planning for noise and vehicle air emissions along land-based road and rail transport corridors. This study arose out of inter-agency discussions about the Parramatta Road corridor development and will assist the Government to develop appropriate planning approaches that minimise noise and air impacts.

Existing Government noise management strategies, such as the NSW Industrial Noise Policy (EPA 2000) and Environmental Criteria for Road Traffic Noise (EPA 1999), need to be linked to planning controls to ensure best practice mitigation and management measures for noise-generating land uses and activities.