Heritage Victoria has released updated guidance on the Heritage Impact Statements and policy on Reasonable or Economic Use.
The Guidelines for Preparing Heritage Impact Statements
Replacing the September 2020 'Guidelines for Preparing Heritage Impact Statements'. The updated June 2021 document:
- provides greater clarity on the role of the pre-application meeting
- confirms local government heritage policy should be considered in the heritage impact statement
- updates references to reasonable or economic use policy
- prompts the consultant to recommend conditions or staging of an approval.
Reasonable or Economic Use
The policy on 'Reasonable or Economic Use' replaces the 2012 policy. The new policy:
- updates references to the Heritage Act 2017 and removes references to ‘undue financial hardship’
- distinguishes ‘use’ (activities which occur on the property) from ‘development’ (generally the physical changes made to a property to enable use)
- finds ‘reasonable use’ to be an objective assessment concerned with the reasonable use of the place or object, not what is subjectively reasonable
- finds ‘economic use’ to be broadly concerned with the ongoing economic functioning of the place or object
- indicates the level of information that may be required to support a heritage permit application.
Access the documents on the following pages:
Page last updated: 01/07/24