A City planning decision must be fought because it threatens to open the door to more crowded living that will change the face of Fish Hoek, says a civic group.
The Fish Hoek Valley Ratepayers’ and Residents’ Association (FHVRRA) is urging residents who objected to the City’s proposed deletion of restrictive title deeds for an Exeter Avenue property in 2022, to appeal its approval.
The Municipal Planning Tribunal (MPT) approved the deletion of restrictive title deeds for the property on Tuesday February 20 and those who objected to it have until Monday March 18 to appeal.
In November 2022, residents were asked to have their say about the the deletion of restrictive title deeds that would allow for subdividing, boundary setbacks, and three dwellings per property, under the City’s Municipal Planning By-law.
The by-law was passed in 2015 and an amendment to it, which took effect in early 2020, allowed for, among other things, a third dwelling, as an additional use right, on single residential properties.
However, properties in Extension 7 of Fish Hoek have been shielded from the by-law due to restrictions in their title deeds.
The City’s mayoral committee member for spatial planning and environment, Eddie Andrews, said that when Fish Hoek Township Extension 7 was created around 1953, the Administrator of the Cape imposed numerous conditions that were inserted as title deed restrictions.
At the time, Mr Andrews said, title deed restrictions were mostly used to achieve a particular look and feel of an area to set the development parameters and uses permitted on properties.
Zoning schemes had since been established to regulate land-use development and character within Cape Town, he said.
However, FHVRRA chairman Brian Youngblood said the approval of the deletion of restrictive title deeds would “change the face of Fish Hoek”.
Subdividing, he said, would allow densification, and the new owners of the subdivided property would also want to build on their new smaller properties.
Deleting “not more than half the area” would mean larger buildings per erf or the same size building as on a currently sized erf, and building closer to the boundary walls would start invading the privacy of neighbours.
Mr Youngblood said that while the City had always argued that “precedent is not a criterion for decision-making”, once set, the association had seen many examples of other developers citing a precedent.
“This is the danger in the City deleting the title deed conditions. Previously, it was another hurdle to the City’s densification, which our community has repeatedly told us is unacceptable to them,” he said.
The City’s argument that “the application is for a single residential property” and “is unlikely to cause significant infrastructure overload” or impact school capacity, could be valid for a single exception, but not when it opened the door for others to apply and flood the existing infrastructure capacity.
That, he said, would “change the character of the area” or at least, negatively impact City infrastructure services.
“The City says it will develop additional infrastructure capacity upon demand, but they have repeatedly failed to cater for incremental demand increases. We need to send a message to our politicians that communities are important and that we wish to preserve our uniqueness,” he said.
Mr Andrews said the majority of the objectors misunderstood the application as relating to all the properties in Extension 7 of the Fish Hoek Township due to the map that had been attached with the original notice to comment.
He said the deletion only applied to the Exeter Avenue property and should the landowner want to subdivide the property, an application for subdivision in terms of the (MPBL) should be submitted.
The subdivision application would need to be advertised, he said, adding that the deletion of the “no subdivision” title deed condition did not give a right or even an expectation to subdivision.
Second or third dwellings needed to comply with the specific development rules in the Development Management Scheme (DMS) and were subject to the approval of plans.
The setbacks applicable in the DMS, Mr Andrews said, were not significantly different from those in the title deed conditions as the DMS allowed for a street setback of 3.5 metres vs 4.72 metres in the title deed.
A garage or carport setback in the DMS allowed for a setback of 5 metres vs 4.72 metres in the title deed, and a common boundary setback of 3 metres in the DMS vs 3.15 metres in the title deed.
Should you wish to appeal, contact Mr Youngblood at fishhoekrra@gmail.com before Monday March 18.
