General Planning Advice Service

The City provides general planning advice to the residents and development industry professionals via the City’s General Planning Advice Service.

This complimentary service provides the ability to discuss your general planning queries with a Planning Officer or a Planning Administration Officer via a 20-minute appointment. Appointments can be booked as follows:

• a telephone call (available Monday to Friday, 10am-3pm)
• an in-person meeting (available Monday, Tuesday and Friday, 10am-3pm)

Please be advised that there will be no general planning advice appointments available from Tuesday 24 December 2024 till Friday 3 January 2025 (both days inclusive).

All appointments are required to be booked 24 hours in advance using the City’s online booking system. Any meeting appointments made for Wednesday and Thursday will be rescheduled to a later time/date.

Same day appointments are not available.

What general planning advice can I receive?

The City provides general advice on planning queries that do not require a submission of an application to receive detailed planning advice, such as lodgement of a Deemed-to-Comply Check, Development Application or Subdivision Application.

The scope of general planning advice is limited to:

• Zoning, land use, development requirements for a site and any applicable development approval exemptions.
• Applicable planning framework including any structure plan, local development plan, state and/or local planning policies etc.
• Procedural enquiries such as development approval process including any consultation requirements, Development Assessment Panel and Design Review Panel process.
• Advice on what type of development application is required.
• Planning fees, payment methods, and refund of fees process.
• Online application lodgements.
• Archival search process.

All advice provided by the City through the General Planning Advice Service is general in nature, is provided in good faith and does not involve any detailed assessment or determination of matter discussed.

All advice provided by the City during each appointment will be summarised and provided in an email to each customer for clarification.

The City does not accept responsibility for any monetary or otherwise loss through the use of the advice provided by the City in that manner.