Lennox Head has grown rapidly in the past 20 years, accounting for almost 70% of all development in the Ballina Shire. By 2045, the Lennox Head and Skennars Head catchment is forecast to grow by 67% and Cumbalum-Tintenbar-Kinvara is forecast to grow by 71%. There have been many benefits to this growth, but its also had its drawbacks, including pressures on housing affordability, traffic, parking, schools and hospitals.

The reality is, many of these large developments have been decades in the making, identified in the 1990s as "Strategic Urban Growth Areas" or "SUGAs" for short. You may not realise that there are still several large areas designated for residential growth in and around Lennox Head in Council's long-term Strategic Plan, including those shown below:

In the last term of Council, strategic urban growth areas were reviewed and staff recommended that these areas were no longer required for urban expansion due to various constraints and because we have already enough undeveloped residential land to meet demand for more than 20 years. But the majority of Councillors voted to keep them on the Plan.

Last weel Council supported my ammendment to remove the above three areas from Council's Local Strategic Planning Statement, but the decision is at risk of being overturned at the next meeting.

If you think we should wait for the land already approved for housing to be developed before inviting developers to propose more greenfield housing developments then sign my petition to let Council know.

You can also find out more about these and other proposed residential growth areas in the Ballina Shire here.