APPEAL — modification application — self storage units — traffic safety and efficiency — sufficiency of information to address potential environmental impacts
Quick Take
1An expert traffic witness who relies entirely on traffic generation estimates supplied by the parties whose case depends on those estimates, without independent corroboration, and who has not visited the site to assess critical physical features such as sight distances, will have their evidence rejected as lacking probative value.
2A revised position from TfNSW (as the roads authority) does not bind the Court; the Court must evaluate the merits of the evidence adduced, and where the reasoning in the agency's correspondence is inadequately explained or backed by questionable evidence, it may be given limited weight against cogent contrary expert evidence.
3The persuasive burden on an applicant for modification of development consent (per Australian Protein Recyclers Pty Ltd v Goulburn Mulwaree Shire Council [2006] NSWLEC 641) includes providing sufficient information to prove that environmental impacts of the proposed modifications — including earthworks, stormwater and drainage — can be satisfactorily addressed; a paucity of such information is fatal to the application.
