WHEN sustainability campaigner Chris Ferreira first proposed adding two eco-apartments to his Hamilton Hill property, the idea was to show that infill housing didn’t have to mean bulldozing established gardens and cramming more buildings onto a block.
Six years later, the homes are finished, but Mr Ferreira says the experience has demonstrated just how difficult it can be to turn an innovative approach to housing into reality.
The Forever Project director received initial approval from the City of Cockburn in 2020, with the two new apartments completed by October 2023.
But almost three years later, he is still waiting for the final pieces of the process to fall into place.
The last hurdle is obtaining separate titles for the new homes, with Mr Ferreira waiting on his bank to complete the process.
Once that is done, he will be able to sell the additional homes, although he plans to retain one as an investment.
• Spot the homes amongst the greenery: The Forever Project’s Chris Ferreira had a dream to build four homes on a suburban block but keep his canopy, but he says unnecessary red tape made it a slow and costly exercise. Photo by Steve Grant
Mr Ferreira says the project has cost more than $40,000 in approvals and compliance costs and required six different kinds of building approvals, along with sign-off from three different building surveyors.
The surveyors, he says, at various times demanded additional work including completely replacing the stairs, installing a $7000 fire-rated structure beneath the upstairs balcony and reshaping pathways.
The unusual design also created difficulties for authorities trying to fit it into conventional development categories.
“One of my friends told me that I’m creating titles out of thin air.”
The comment referred to one apartment sitting above the other, although Mr Ferreira says the homes are bespoke designs rather than simply apartments stacked directly on top of each other.
Mr Ferreira counts off on his fingers the additional building approvals required by the City of Cockburn for the upstairs apartment. By the time he reached his second hand, his frustration was obvious.
He says the contrast with his earlier experience of council was particularly disappointing.
When Mr Ferreira was making the existing building on his property more sustainable, he says the council had been incredibly helpful. The innovative infill project, however, was a different story, with the additional approvals and requirements adding significantly to the cost.
The project’s catchphrase is “4 Homes, 4 families AND 40 trees”, reflecting Mr Ferreira’s aim to add housing while retaining and enhancing the established gardens and trees.
The apartments were promoted as WA’s first “Passiv Haus” wooden-frame apartments, incorporating recycled products, solar and battery storage, rainwater storage and greywater systems. They have achieved a 9.5-star energy rating and are designed to cut water and power use by about 50 per cent.
Mr Ferreira says the experience has reinforced his concern that the planning system favours conventional development over innovation.
“My biggest concern is that the system is biased towards the tried and tested style of development even if this patently lacking in form, function, sustainability and resilience. Innovation is stymied by bureaucracy because authorities fear change and something new.”
He says that is particularly troubling given the pressures facing Perth.
“In an era where we face a housing crisis, cost of living pressures, the impacts of an ever hotter drier climate, unchecked urban tree removal coupled with the social malaise of isolation and loneliness you would think council and the WA government would be doing all they can to support and usher in new ideas to tackle this disparate suite of problems.
“The truth is no one considering infill development would undertake such an eco-apartments venture if they knew just how difficult, convoluted, opaque and slow the planning process was.”
by STEVE GRANT