The concerns are the imposition that the two-three storey-high 69-metre-long modern glass and steel commercial extension will bring on neighbours; the all-night security lighting/traffic noise/assumption of public parking spaces; the disturbances that 60+ guests (to the motel and two function rooms) bring; and the exposure from the removal of many established boundary trees in a residential heritage conservation area. 

The commercial idea is accepted, but there are valid concerns. It was unhelpful at the on-site meeting for your architect to claim this (DA) will be a precedent for the future. 

The CWD’s article (“Try round-table discussion for size” on the same day) reports that you will give neighbours a choice of trees to show you “want transparency”.

This implies openness  - but why stop short here when the objections go a lot further than re-greening?  

The neighbour’s artistic impressions produced for the meeting went some way to depicting the monolithic size of this development in the absence of any DA visuals, even in electronic form.

 Your 2D rendering in the article shows an odd view from the street-gutter of Hill Street’s car wash. To save us from speculating and for transparency, could you please supply a range of perspectives with spatial relevance for council's February report?

The idea that this scale of development is the only viable option ignores reasonable and demonstrable concerns from the community and neighbours.

Is bigger better? Council procedures and due diligence must be followed for any DA. 

I remain hopeful that the report and response addresses these objections so as to imbue confidence in public debate on such matters.

Diana Smith, Orange