LANDSCAPE DESIGN:
BLUE MOUNTAINS
Do you need a Landscape Design or Garden Design for your property in the Blue Mountains?
New Terrain Landscape Design is based in the Blue Mountains and this gives us a special insight into the needs and challenges of landscape and garden design in the Blue Mountains. With a difference in elevation of more that 1000 metres between the lowest and highest towns in the Blue Mountains there’s a huge variation in the climate which affects which types of plants are suited to grow in each town. Many plants that would thrive in the Lower Mountains towns like Springwood or Glenbrook would be killed by the frosts and occasional snows of the Upper Mountains towns like Katoomba and Blackheath. Likewise, there are many species of flowering perennial bulbs and fruits such as apples and raspberries that benefit from the cold and frosts of the Upper Mountains because they require a certain number of hours near or below freezing each year in order to reset for Spring. New Terrain can provide a landscape design for you that suit your specific climate and garden style.
What Do I need for a D.A. in the Blue Mountains?
The towns of the Blue Mountains are set in the middle of a UNESCO World Heritage Site. What does that mean for you? The Blue Mountains City Council has some of the strictest rules in the region regarding the types of documentation that are needed for many sites considered for development. The Council can also be very strict with the types of plants and planting styles used in your garden depending on where you live.
The rules that inform the development of the are you live in is called a DCP, or Developmental Control Plan. The DCP for the Blue Mountains requires that a Landscape Plan comes with:
A Site Survey conducted by a professional surveyor indicating site contours, slope, and site features such as buildings and existing trees.
A detailed Site Assessment Plan indicating the features of your site such as sun path, wind exposure, good and bad views, the presence of priority weeds that need to be removed and sources of noise such as a highway for example
A Landscape Plan scaled at 1:100 or 1:200 on A3 paper showing hardscape and softscape features including existing trees and proposed plants and trees
A Plant Schedule listing all of the proposed plants including: quantities, typical heights and widths of the plants at a mature size (or at 10 years old for trees), their Latin/scientific names, common names and the pot size they’re to be ordered in.
Knowing your BAL or Fire Rating can have a big impact on what kind of plants you can plant, how many plants and trees you will be able to plant and even how close to your home they can be planted if you have to maintain an Asset Protection Zone or APZ in areas more prone to fire risk. New Terrain’s familiarity with Bushfire Planting Requirements and Guidelines can help you with the garden design and plant selection process.
Knowing the Living Zone that you live in such as R1 Residential Zone, C4 Living Conservation Zone, etc. can make a huge difference in the types of plants and amounts of plants you will need to have in your landscape plan to fulfil the Council’s basic requirements. New Terrain’s knowledge of the Living Zones, garden styles and plant selections in the Blue Mountains can help you get your landscape concept approved.
Contact us to see how we can help you.
Working with Native and Exotic Plants
There’s a huge variety of native and exotic plants that are available for landscape designs however many of them are not suited to be used in the Blue Mountains. Many of the plant nurseries in the Sydney region specialise in growing and selling plants more suited to the hotter and more humid climate of Sydney. Knowing which plants will work and won’t work in the mountains requires extensive plant knowledge.
Australian native plants are always and excellent option when considering a landscape plan. When the right plant is selected for the right spot, natives can help sustain native wildlife and pollinators and can be much hardier than their exotic counterparts. Many people don’t realise that there’s a whole list of native plants that can be planted around the Sydney region that the Blue Mountains Council will not allow on the landscape plan. Native trees such as the Silky Oak (Grevillea robusta) and the Illawarra Flame Tree (Bracychiton acerifolius) and even the ever-useful Westringia shrub are being snubbed on landscape plans in the Blue Mountains Council because of their potential threat as becoming dominating weeds in the Blue Mountains ecosystems. The same is true for many exotic plants. There are popular exotic plants such as Butterfly Bush (Buddleia/Buddleja) and Coral/Firecracker Plant (Russell equisetiformis) that can be sold and used in places as close as Penrith but are completely forbidden from planting schemes in the Blue Mountains because of weed potential. While the popular agapanthus can be seen everywhere in the Blue Mountains and is used in planting schemes all over Sydney, agapanthus is considered a weed and new plantings will not be allowed on a D.A. submission.
Some homeowners might buy a house or want to develop a piece of land and have decided that they would like a fully native landscape. Depending on where your property is situated, the Blue Mountains Council may not actually allow you to do that. If you live in an area considered to be an area where exotic gardens have become a historical feature of the area such as parts of Leura, Wentworth Falls or Blackheath, Council may require you to plant a garden in keeping with the character of the neighbourhood. The opposite is true if you live in an area dominated by Australian native bush such as an Environmental Living Zone or near a creek, stream or river. Council may limit the exotic plants you wish to plant and may require you to plant native species for the purpose of maintaining and encouraging the health of the native ecosystems that your property sits on.
It all seems a bit complicated and it is, but New Terrain can use our experience and knowledge of the plants, climate and rules and regulations of the Blue Mountains to get a great landscape plan for you.
Contact us to see how we can help you.
Servicing the
Blue Mountains
Landscape design services for the Lower and Upper Blue Mountains. Landscape and garden design for Glenbrook, Lapstone, Emu Plains, Emu Heights, Blaxland, Warimoo, Hawkesbury Heights, Yellow Rock, Springwood, Winmalee, Faulconbridge, Linden, Valley Heights, Woodford, Hazelbrook, Lawson, Bullaburra, Wentworth Falls, Leura, Katoomba, Medlow Bath, Megalong, Shipley. Blackheath, Mt. Victoria, Mt. Wilson, Kurrajong, Hartley Vale, Hartley, Little Hartley, Richmond, Hampton, Zig Zag, Lithgow.
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