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Thursday, 16 April 2009 |
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Home>Building in a Bushfire Prone Area
| The 2006/07 bushfires in Mansfield Shire clearly highlighted the importance of building and positioning your home to reduce its vulnerability to fire.
To protect individuals and your assets you are encouraged to give consideration to the fire safety features that can be incorporated into your home.
Areas that should be considered are the general location, site features and the attributes of the building. Further details regarding these matters can be found by clicking on the two document links at the bottom of this page.
Bushfire Prone Areas
Currently no areas of the municipality have been formally declared as ‘Bushfire Prone Areas’ under the Building Legislation, however this is now under review.
The impact of such a declaration is that buildings would need to be built so as to be more resistant to ember attack than otherwise required. Three categories exist from extreme to low hazard based on proximity to mature dense vegetation and steepness of topography.
Features that would normally be found in a dwelling built to the newer 5 Star energy requirements (particularly if built on a slab) will meet most requirements in accordance with this Bushfire prone standard. Additional requirements include metal flywire screens and the closure of all gaps. Western red cedar and similar external timber cladding would not be permitted on sites with an ‘extreme’ rating.
The Australian Standard 3959 covers these strategies and more (see link below).
Wildfire Management Overlay
Similar to the above, the Municipality currently is not affected by any ‘Wildfire Management Overlays’ which can be introduced into the Planning Scheme.
While related, the Bushfire Prone Area designation impacts on the building construction whereas the Wildfire Management Overlay considers the building site and surrounding area and proposes measures to reduce or counter the impact of the fire threat and the capacity to defend a dwelling under threat. The proximity of vegetation, its type and density together with slope, access to the site and fire fighting water source are all taken into account in determining legal requirements.
The CFA have produced a detailed “Building in a Wildfire Management Overlay” Applicants kit to guide development through a self assessment process. (See link below.)
Council strongly encourages all applicants to consider the voluntary inclusion of such safety features within their redevelopment.
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