Acting on an approved DA, the owner of 3 Belvedere St, Kiama, has today begun removing all of the 37 trees on the industrial zoned property to make way for 22 storage units.

Weriton Properties’ DA was approved by Council in December 2019 (Councillors Rice, Rielly and Westhoff against), despite strong opposition from residents who were concerned about the habitat loss for the valley and other environmental impacts. While most were identified as weed species, fourteen of the mature trees were identified by an arborist as being significant to the landscape.

Since that time, an amended DA was lodged to include light industrial units and sublevel parking spaces in the complex. Amongst other things, this approval process required further flora and fauna reports to be done, in particular because of the sighting of a rare bird.

That DA has recently been withdrawn, and work has started on the original DA that approved the tree removal.

The same northern edge, earlier in the day

“I’m concerned about the process and only time will tell what the eventual outcome for this development will be,” says Councillor Kathy Rice.

“Will it be all self-storage units, or will there be a modification to include industrial units as well?”

She accepts it would have been difficult to keep all of the trees, but is disappointed it wasn’t designed to include even a few of the mature trees.

“I feel it is disrespectful of the knowledge of locals who know how well habited by birds this area is,” she says.

Camilla Kerr-Ruston, who lives adjacent to the site and led a campaign to save the trees, says she is resigned to the situation.

“They are doing nothing illegal, but I think what they are doing is immoral.

“From the start, he didn’t even consider keeping the trees as he was told by someone in Council that it would be fine to take down all the trees.

“Come election time, I’m going to make sure that people are reminded who allowed this to happen. I tried everything, but they didn’t listen.”

The storage units as advertised for sale on the Raine & Horne site

Approached for comment, Weriton Properties’ Graham Werry said, “I acknowledge that no one likes change, but the development is low scale, has minimal impact, low noise emission, and is aesthetically pleasing.

“I expect that the new development will improve the neighbours’ property values by removing the uncertainty which would otherwise have hung over an underdeveloped industrial zoned site.”