Building in bushfire prone areas - new laws, new confusion

As Viktoria and the Android have mentioned previously, Australia is introducing new laws regulating where you build and the type of building you construct, in relation to "bushfire prone areas".

The problem is (like so many government initiatives worldwide) that nationwide regulations are being overlaid on existing (and often very different) State- and Region-specific legislation.  At the present time, there is not even a consistent nationwide definition of what a "bushfire prone area" is.  And yet, the regulations set out in the Australian Building Code and National Construction Code are meant to be applied equally.

Can anyone see a problem with that?

Suffice to say, if you are looking at building on a piece of land in Australia, and you want to know whether it is considered to be "Bushfire Prone" and you can't locate a government map as not all States have conducted bushfire mapping, the following definition may apply (at today's date):

BUSHFIRE PRONE AREA means an area of land which is subject, or likely to be subject to bushfires, being any area of land within 100metres of a single area of vegetation of greater than 1 hectare

1. a bushfire prone area does not include land over 20metres from a strip of vegetation less than 20metres in width regardless of length; and
2. areas of vegetation separated by less than 20metres are to be considered as a contiguous area of vegetation for the purposes of defining a bushfire prone area.

Our own unique problem with this new legislation appears to stem from the fact that we want to build on a cliff.  The bushfire consultant has said "no" due to the degree of slope of the cliff (like, you know, it's a cliff).

Where it gets confusing is because the Australian Standards are silent on the issue of building near a slope with a > 40 degree incline. We believe that the bushfire consultant's assumption that, in the absence of any specific regulation, the site must therefore be disallowed, is incorrect.

Tasmania has not, to date, declared bushfire-prone areas for the purposes of the Australian Building Code. The Building Act 2000 therefore, does not currently require that the construction of residential buildings in areas susceptible to bushfires be built to the standard required under the Australian Building Code.

Further, one would think that a reasonable person would expect that there should be greater flexibility applied to buildings being considered on existing titles compared to new titles. To do otherwise would unduly impact on the value of existing titles. Ours is an existing title.

The Tasmanian Fire Service's Guidelines for Development in Bushfire Prone Areas of Tasmania 2005 is the only document currently formally referenced or relied upon by the majority of planning schemes in Tasmania. Within that document, it states that buildings on slopes, which are cut into the slope will be momre sheltered during a bushfire. Buildings on slabs on the ground are also considered the safest.

Our intention is to build a home on a slab on the ground and cut into the slope.

TIP: Given that new Australian regulations on building and construction in relation to bushfires are only likely to become tougher - always involve a bushfire consultant very early in the design and development process.

Our architect neal has one more meeting scheduled for next week with the bushfire consultant to see if there is any way we can build on our chosen site.

How would you rate our chances??

We'll let you know how things turn out...