With the introduction of the State Government’s Local Environmental Plan (LEP) template for every Council in NSW, the NSW Department of Planning removed a specific zoning for places of worship, thereby allowing places of public worship for every residential zone, and set a maximum limit of 250 worshippers per piece of land. 

In recent years, new places of public worship communities within the Parramatta local government area have sprung up, particularly in low density residential areas. In these neighbourhoods, while most are welcoming of places of worship, neighbourhood difficulties and conflicts have arisen when upwards to 250 people and 100+ private vehicles congregate in low density neighbourhoods every week, sometimes even every other day, and at times even at night.

These problems are fundamentally compounded when a small house normally designed for a small family is bought by a new faith community because of it is a relatively cheap investment to set up their faith community. They in the short term becomes so successful that their place of worship attracts traffic congestions in once quiet neighbourhood streets, and their normal operations spills into what is considered normal times for sleeping and private recreation for the immediate neighbours.

When this was explained around October 2009 to the NSW Department of Planning, it appears that the Department understood the unintended consequence of their Local Environmental Plan (LEP) template and thereby allowed Parramatta City Council to remove places of worship in the (R2) low density residential zones, while leaving the other residential zones open to places of worship, if Council so chose to do so.

After a public consultation process where representation from the Catholic Diocese of Parramatta, St Paul’s Anglican Church, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, the Parramatta Mission and the Redeemer Baptist School were included, a number of additional key changes were also accepted:

• that the maximum seating capacity of 250 people should apply only within the residential zones (excluding the R2 low density residential zone), and not to other zones like commercial and industrial zones
• that the regulation for places of public worship should be open to all, not just the local community
• that encouragement, not compulsion, is given to new places of worship with capacities of over 250 people be in non-residential zones
• that parking needs and traffic impact assessment are required of new places of worship.

The effect of these changes is to balance the support Parramatta has for places of worship, but also to respect the needs of residential neighbourhoods, especially low density ones.

From my Christian perspective, a commandment was given “Love thy neighbour as thyself”. Such improvements are to help both places of public worship and their neighbours to love each other.

Click here for the Council report on the Draft Parramatta regulations for Places of Worship (approved on 24 May 2010)