Attachment 4 - Officer Report Dated 12 September 2023

PLANNING & ENVIRONMENT COMMITTEE MEETING                                      12 SEPTEMBER 2023


  Existing Use of Land             Kabi Road Golf Course and Orchard


  STATUTORY DETAILS

  SEQRP Designation                Regional Landscape and Rural Production Area

  Zone                             Rural

  Precinct                         Not Applicable

  Local Plan Area                  Not applicable

  Overlays                         Land subject to acid sulfate soils
                                   Agricultural land
                                   Biodiversity, Waterways and Wetlands
                                   Bushfire Hazard
                                   Flood Hazard

  Assessment Type                  Other Change to Approval – Impact Assessment

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
This report provides an assessment of an Other Change application to a current development
approval for the Kabi Road Golf Course to include group farm stays for up to 299 persons. The
proposed facility is to be used for school camps, weekend groups and school holiday use with up to
50 staff engaged on site. The vision is to provide a farm to plate visitor accommodation experience
for groups interested in permaculture and includes 3 villages, each with their own dining area and a
large communal area. A total of 126 car parking spaces are proposed on site, with buses to park on
the villages’ internal loop roads. The applicant proposes to upgrade Kabi Road to a 6.2-metre-wide
seal to accommodate the anticipated increase in traffic.

The site is zoned Rural and comprises 3 lots with a total area of approximately 130ha. The golf
course was originally approved only over 2 of these lots, with 15ha approved as a golf course, 14ha
as a permaculture orchard and the remainder retained as natural vegetation. Lot 650, being the
northern most lot, is not part of the existing development approval and has been mostly cleared for
farming purposes.

The assessment of the application found that while the nature of the use makes it suitable for a rural
property rather than urban, the proposed farm stay activity does not further the SEQ Regional Plan
2017 strategies and far exceeds the scale intended by the Noosa Plan 2020. While both documents
support tourism on rural lands, the SEQ Regional Plan 2017 also seeks that on-farm agricultural
activities are intensified or diversified, with the Noosa Plan 2020 seeking that land mapped as
Agricultural Land Conservation is protected and rural accommodation is complementary, small scale
and fit for the site and locality.

The proposed permaculture and food production is not of a significant scale, largely intended for
farm stay guests and will alienate agricultural land, with large areas of the site identified as
Agriculture Land Conservation. The farm stay activity will also be the primary use rather than a
complementary use, is not small scale having a gross floor area of 8,325m2 and is an entirely
different scale and character to the approved golf course and orchard where a former Queenslander
dwelling was renovated as a clubhouse/restaurant. The proposal is also of a more permanent nature