Dog and the legal generator

Bill was sitting on Tom’s veranda when a generator started somewhere beyond the fence.

It wasn’t especially loud. Just a steady engine note that rose and fell every few seconds.

Dog lifted his head.

“What’s that?” Bill asked.

“Neighbour’s generator.”

“Power out?”

“No. He uses it in his shed.”

Bill nodded. “Fair enough.”

Half an hour later, the generator was still going.

Dog moved under the table.

“Runs for a while, does it?”

“Most of the day.”

They drank their tea.

The generator droned on.

After another ten minutes, Bill said, “You notice it more once you’ve noticed it.”

“That’s the trouble,” said Tom. “You can’t unnotice it.”

“Have you spoken to him?”

“He had it tested. Says it meets the environmental noise standard.”

“So it’s legal?”

“Apparently.”

The engine changed pitch, settled again, then returned to its steady drone.

Bill looked across the paddock.

“Wouldn’t worry me for half an hour.”

“Doesn’t worry me for half an hour.”

“Would after six hours.”

“It does.”

“And tomorrow?”

“Tomorrow too.”

Dog sighed beneath the table.

“But if it meets the standard,” Bill said, “doesn’t that mean the noise is acceptable?”

“It means the meter recorded an acceptable number,” said Tom. “The meter doesn’t sit on my veranda every day.”

They listened for a while.

“Could he put it around the other side of the shed?” Bill asked.

“Probably.”

“Build an enclosure?”

“Probably.”

“Run a longer lead?”

“Probably.”

The generator coughed, went silent for three glorious seconds, then started again.

Dog crawled inside.

Bill watched him go.

“Well,” he said, “there’s your amenity test.”

Tom raised an eyebrow.

“The noise is legal,” Bill said. “But it’s still deciding whether you, me and Dog can enjoy your veranda.”

A few weeks later, the neighbour shifted the generator behind the shed and put an enclosure around it.

He kept using it.

Tom kept using his veranda.

Dog returned to his patch beneath the table.

“Generator still legal?” Bill asked.

“As far as I know.”

“And now?”

“Now it’s legal somewhere sensible.”

What Tom learned - The generator taught Tom one small part of a much bigger planning idea.

In planning, amenity means the qualities of a place that affect how people use and enjoy it. Noise is part of amenity, but so are appearance, smell, dust, lighting, traffic, privacy, safety and the general character of an area. It also includes the activities already taking place there.

Imagine a quiet local park beside a primary school. Then a 24-hour waste depot opens across the road. The park is still there. Its grass, playground and trees have not been removed. But people using it may now experience trucks, reversing alarms, machinery, industrial lighting and occasional smells. The place has not disappeared, but what it is like to use that place has changed. That is an amenity effect.

In this Bill, Tom and Dog yarn, the generator met the environmental noise standard. That answered one narrow question: did the measured noise exceed a particular limit under the conditions tested?

It did not answer a different question: had the constant mechanical drone changed what it was like to sit on Tom’s veranda?

The same distinction matters at Glan Devon. The planning question is not limited to whether the proposed facility can meet individual noise, air-quality or odour limits at the nearest house. It must also consider whether this type and scale of industry is compatible with the existing rural locality and the ways people already use it.

Barkers Creek at Mondure Crossing is not merely a blue line on a map. Visit South Burnett promotes it for fishing and kayaking and identifies Mondure Crossing as an access point. Local people also use the area for swimming, birdwatching, photography and other outdoor activities.

Deep Dime is an existing farm-stay and RV accommodation business farther along Mondure Crossing Road. It promotes creekside camping, swimming, birdlife, quietness and its rural setting. Visitors spend time outdoors, including during quiet evenings and nights. Measuring effects only at the nearest dwelling could therefore miss the places where people actually experience them.

Visitors travelling from the Burnett Highway must also pass the proposed facility to reach Mondure Crossing or Deep Dime. Its entrance, signs, buildings, stack, cooling towers, acoustic barriers, lighting and vehicle movements could become part of that journey. Visitors may share the road with trucks and experience noise, odour or dust much closer to the facility than they would at the creek.

Visual screening does not automatically solve that problem. Dense planting sufficient to hide an industrial facility may look artificial in the existing open dry sclerophyll landscape. Planting that matches the existing vegetation may provide little screening. Either way, it cannot hide the entrance, trucks, signage, lighting or anything rising above it—and it may take years to mature.

Noise also involves more than an overall decibel number. Machinery, fans, cooling equipment, trucks and reversing alarms can produce hums, tones or low-frequency rumbling. These may be especially noticeable against a quiet rural background or during still nights and temperature inversions. But noise is only one part of the assessment. Odour, lighting, traffic, industrial structures and the combined effect of round-the-clock activity may all contribute to changing the character of a place.

None of this proves that every effect will be serious or that the development must be refused. Some effects may be small. Others may be reduced through better design, operating limits or a more suitable location. But they must first be identified, assessed where people actually experience them, and controlled by conditions that can be enforced.

“Amenity” is not a planning word for “I don’t want it here.” Personal dislike of biosolids, waste processing or industrial development is not enough.

A useful amenity argument identifies something concrete:

• What quality or existing use of the place matters?

• Who experiences it, and where?

• What part of the development may affect it?

• How often, for how long and under what conditions?

• Has that effect actually been assessed?

• Can it realistically be prevented or controlled?

“The facility will ruin the area” says very little.

“Campers use an outdoor creekside area at night, but continuous low-frequency plant noise has not been assessed at that location” identifies a planning issue.

As Tom learned from the generator, a meter can measure one effect. It cannot, by itself, measure what happens to the veranda—or to the road, the campground, the swimming hole and the rural place around them.

For a more detailed discussion of 'Amenity' and Planning Approvals, click here

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