Heritage, flood and other overlays in Warragul and Drouin

The short version

A building permit covers restumping. A planning permit only comes into it when an overlay in the Baw Baw Planning Scheme says so. For most houses in the shire none does. For a house in one of the heritage precincts, on flood-prone land near Hazel Creek or on the Moe River flats, on a steep block in the Strzelecki foothills, or in a bushfire area, something extra may apply, and the building surveyor asks before issuing the permit. This page says what the overlays are and where to look.

Heritage

Baw Baw's Heritage Permit Exemptions Incorporated Plan lists the heritage precincts in the shire: Drouin's Princes Way residential precinct; Erica and Rawson townships; Thorpdale township; Trafalgar's Contingent Street and Princes Highway East; and in Warragul, Bowen Street, Peace Avenue, the Victoria and Albert streets precinct, Victoria Street North and the Queen Street town centre. Individually listed places sit alongside them, from the Baw Baw Heritage Study of 2006.

What the overlay does to a restump: usually nothing visible. The exemptions plan treats routine maintenance of non-significant buildings and work to the rear wall of contributory buildings as exempt from a planning permit, and stumps are below the floor where no streetscape sees them. But the plan does not mention restumping, underpinning, footings or stumps by name, so for a contributory house in one of those streets the question is put to council before the building permit is issued. Raising a house, which changes its height, is a different matter in a heritage street and should be assumed to need a planning permit.

Flood

VICSES's flood guide for the shire says Baw Baw has a history of flooding including significant events in May and June 2012, and that most residential flooding occurs in townships along the Princes Highway corridor: Warragul, Drouin, Drouin South, Trafalgar and Yarragon. The Warragul local flood guide names Hazel Creek and Spring Creek as the town's main waterways, records flooding in February 2011 and February 2019, and notes the retarding basins near Tarwin Street, Brooker Park and Landsborough Road. The Moe River flats guide says the flats flood frequently.

In the planning scheme, flood-prone land carries a Land Subject to Inundation Overlay or a Floodway Overlay. Council proposed updating those maps for the whole shire in Amendment C144, received 153 submissions, and abandoned it in September 2022 because the big subdivisions in Warragul and Drouin had built new drainage that would alter the modelled flood mapping, and both towns had grown considerably since the last modelling. So the overlay maps on VicPlan are not the last word on where water goes. For a restump, flood matters in two ways: the building surveyor needs council's report and consent under the Building Regulations for building work on flood-prone land, with advice from Melbourne Water or the West Gippsland Catchment Management Authority; and the subfloor of a house on that ground needs drainage designed for it, which is the drainage page.

Erosion and landslip

The Baw Baw scheme carries an Erosion Management Overlay, clause 44.01. Where it is mapped is a VicPlan question for the specific address; this site does not claim it covers any particular town. Separately, the regional catchment strategy describes parts of the Strzeleckis as very prone to erosion and landslip, and landslips hit roads at Trafalgar South, Seaview and Allambee after heavy rain in October 2020. Underpinning or deep restumping on a steep block there is a job for an engineer whatever the overlay says, and the hills page covers it.

Bushfire

Council's Bushfire Management Overlay page says the planning scheme already applies the overlay to bushfire risk areas and that around 3,067 more properties are proposed to come into it, while bushfire construction standards already apply to designated bushfire prone areas under the Building Act. A restump does not change a house's bushfire rating, but a building permit in a bushfire prone area carries construction requirements, and the surveyor will say whether any touch the subfloor, for instance enclosing it.

How to check an address

1. VicPlan. The state planning map shows zones and overlays for any address. Heritage Overlay, Land Subject to Inundation Overlay, Floodway Overlay, Erosion Management Overlay and Bushfire Management Overlay each show as a layer.
2. Council's property information. Baw Baw's property information certificate under regulation 51 states whether the land is flood prone, bushfire prone, likely to be subject to termite infestation (the whole shire is deemed termite prone) and subject to snowfall, and a building permit record search shows what has been permitted before.
3. Ask council. Baw Baw Shire's planning department on 03 5624 2411 confirms whether a planning permit is needed for a contributory building in a heritage precinct.
4. The surveyor. The registered building surveyor checks all of it before issuing the building permit, and lodges report and consent where it is needed. Council's page notes a surveyor will usually apply on your behalf.