Grange Planning Brain

title: Gisborne Business Park Expansion Development Plan and Planning Controls council: macedon-ranges state: vic category: strategy classification: MAJOR status: in-progress last_compiled: 2026-05-31 source_docs:

  • 25-march-2026-scheduled-meeting-agenda.pdf
  • 25-march-2026-scheduled-meeting-minutes.pdf
  • final-agenda-attachments-council-meeting-22-october-2025-reduced.pdf
  • gisborne-futures-economic-and-employment-analysis-urban-enterprise-final-may-2020.pdf
  • Gisborne Business Park Development Plan - Macedon Ranges Shire Council
  • gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf
  • gisborne-futures-structure-plan-background-report-august-2023.pdf

Gisborne Business Park Expansion Development Plan and Planning Controls

The Gisborne Business Park expansion is the mechanism for reserving and servicing future employment land south and east of the existing New Gisborne industrial estate, rather than treating the business park as a fixed legacy precinct. The current planning task is no longer just the 2018 draft Development Plan: Council has moved the work into Gisborne Futures Structure Plan implementation and, in March 2026, was procuring consultant work to finalise a planning scheme amendment for expansion to the south and east (Source: 25-march-2026-scheduled-meeting-agenda.pdf, p.170; Source: 25-march-2026-scheduled-meeting-minutes.pdf, p.15).

The planning issue is a sequencing problem. The land-use case is supported by industrial supply analysis, but the statutory pathway depends on rezoning rural living land, applying a Development Plan Overlay or equivalent coordination control, replacing or supplementing existing development contributions controls, and resolving infrastructure items that cannot be left to isolated lot-by-lot permits (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, pp.37-39).

Background

The business park expansion was first framed through the Gisborne and New Gisborne Outline Development Plan, which identified the need for additional industrial land and nominated land fronting Saunders Road as potentially suitable for business-related uses (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, pp.8-9). The draft 2018 Development Plan then proposed expanding the existing Barry Road business park into approximately 29 hectares of adjacent rural living land for commercial and industrial use (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.5).

The draft Development Plan was exhibited in February 2019, and submissions raised traffic, township character, urban design, environmental conditions and potential heritage values at Woiwurrung Cottage, 111 Saunders Road, New Gisborne (Source: Gisborne Business Park Development Plan - Macedon Ranges Shire Council). Council considered those submissions at its 22 May 2019 meeting and, on 18 December 2019, resolved to consider the Business Park Development Plan through the broader Gisborne Futures project so that the precinct could be planned as part of Gisborne’s regional-centre role (Source: Gisborne Business Park Development Plan - Macedon Ranges Shire Council).

The 2023 Gisborne Futures Background Report confirms the strategic shift from a standalone business park plan to a township-wide structure planning question. Gisborne Futures proposes a protected settlement boundary for Gisborne and New Gisborne and identifies future land uses for retail, employment, housing and community services (Source: gisborne-futures-structure-plan-background-report-august-2023.pdf, pp.5-7). Within that framework, the business park is treated as a protected employment precinct that should not be encroached upon or land-locked by residential growth (Source: gisborne-futures-structure-plan-background-report-august-2023.pdf, p.6).

Analysis

Employment Land Supply and the Size of the Expansion

The underlying employment-land case is that Gisborne has limited land zoned specifically for employment outside its town centre. The 2020 economic and employment analysis states that the Gisborne Business Park is the only non-town-centre location in Gisborne zoned specifically for employment and business purposes, with all land in the business park then within the Industrial 1 Zone (Source: gisborne-futures-economic-and-employment-analysis-urban-enterprise-final-may-2020.pdf, p.6). That makes the business park the main place where land-hungry service, construction, warehousing, manufacturing and peripheral commercial activities can be directed without competing for compact town-centre sites (Source: gisborne-futures-economic-and-employment-analysis-urban-enterprise-final-may-2020.pdf, pp.96-101).

The quantitative supply signal is tight. Urban Enterprise estimated 15.0 hectares of current industrial supply in 2020, comprising 2.5 hectares in available lots within the existing business park, 7.4 hectares east of the business park, and 5.1 hectares north of the railway line, with an 80 percent net developable area assumption applied to the latter two areas (Source: gisborne-futures-economic-and-employment-analysis-urban-enterprise-final-may-2020.pdf, p.100). At 0.9 hectares per annum consumption, this represented 13.6 years of supply; at 1.6 hectares per annum, it represented 7.8 years (Source: gisborne-futures-economic-and-employment-analysis-urban-enterprise-final-may-2020.pdf, p.100). The practical effect is that the apparent 15.0 hectare headline supply is not a long-term buffer if demand accelerates or if land is held off-market (Source: gisborne-futures-economic-and-employment-analysis-urban-enterprise-final-may-2020.pdf, p.100).

The rail-line scenario is the main sensitivity. If industrial land north of the railway line is rezoned away from industrial use, the report says remaining vacant industrial supply would fall to between 5.3 and 9.1 years (Source: gisborne-futures-economic-and-employment-analysis-urban-enterprise-final-may-2020.pdf, pp.99-100). If both Site A1 and Site A2 north of the railway line are removed from the industrial supply pool, the additional land requirement rises to 17.3 hectares over 20 years and 28.6 hectares over 30 years (Source: gisborne-futures-economic-and-employment-analysis-urban-enterprise-final-may-2020.pdf, p.101). That explains why the approximately 29 hectare south and east expansion area is not arbitrary: it roughly matches the 30-year replacement requirement under the most constrained rail-line scenario (Source: gisborne-futures-economic-and-employment-analysis-urban-enterprise-final-may-2020.pdf, p.101).

The jobs test points in the same direction. The economic report projects Gisborne SA2 population growth at 2.2 percent per annum and estimates that maintaining the current local jobs ratio would require 2,000 to 3,500 additional jobs over 20 to 30 years (Source: gisborne-futures-economic-and-employment-analysis-urban-enterprise-final-may-2020.pdf, p.101). About 25 percent of those jobs are expected to require industrial land, equating to 500 to 875 industrial-land jobs and 45,000 to 78,750 square metres of floorspace at 90 square metres per job (Source: gisborne-futures-economic-and-employment-analysis-urban-enterprise-final-may-2020.pdf, p.101). Converted to land, that demand is 20 to 36 hectares gross, or about 1.0 to 1.2 hectares per annum over 20 to 30 years (Source: gisborne-futures-economic-and-employment-analysis-urban-enterprise-final-may-2020.pdf, p.101).

Zoning Architecture: C2Z Frontage, IN3Z Behind

The draft Development Plan proposes a two-zone structure, not a single industrial blanket. It recommends applying the Commercial 2 Zone to the Saunders Road frontage and the Industrial 3 Zone to the land behind, up to the existing business park boundary (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.37). The northern title boundaries of 87 and 99 Saunders Road are identified as the logical line between the Commercial 2 Zone and Industrial 3 Zone (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.37).

The mechanism is simple: Saunders Road gives exposure and an address for larger-format commercial and trade-related uses, while IN3Z behind the frontage provides a lighter industrial buffer between the existing IN1Z estate and nearby sensitive uses (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.37). The 2023 Background Report updates that proposition by recommending a Commercial 2 precinct of 5 to 10 hectares in Gisborne for larger-format showrooms and retail spaces, including auto sales, building supplies, pet and equestrian supplies, recreation uses, breweries, distilleries, coffee roasters and specialised workshops (Source: gisborne-futures-structure-plan-background-report-august-2023.pdf, p.79). The same report projects bulky goods expenditure by Gisborne residents increasing from 32 million per annum in 2023 to 59 million per annum in 2051, with most expenditure currently leaving Gisborne for metropolitan Melbourne and Sunbury (Source: gisborne-futures-structure-plan-background-report-august-2023.pdf, p.79).

This zoning structure has a statutory consequence for the town centre. It does not replace the Gisborne town centre as the primary retail and commercial centre; the 2020 economic report states that the town centre should remain the primary location for retail and commercial uses (Source: gisborne-futures-economic-and-employment-analysis-urban-enterprise-final-may-2020.pdf, p.108). Instead, the business park frontage is intended to accommodate uses that need main-road exposure, larger sites, loading space or parking, and that are difficult to fit into fine-grain town-centre lots without harming centre function (Source: gisborne-futures-economic-and-employment-analysis-urban-enterprise-final-may-2020.pdf, pp.96-101).

Development Plan Overlay and Permit Pathway

The draft Development Plan treats a Development Plan Overlay as the main coordination tool. The DPO is proposed because the expansion area is made up of five large rural living lots requiring rezoning plus the already rezoned Sauer Road subdivision, and the plan explicitly says development must be able to proceed without land consolidation (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.17). Without a DPO-style control, each parcel could theoretically solve access, stormwater, frontage and servicing in isolation, producing stranded roads, duplicated basins or inconsistent interfaces (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, pp.17, 37).

The statutory effect of the DPO would be substantial. The draft plan states that a DPO schedule can require a single plan to be prepared and approved for the whole expansion area before permits are granted, and that permits must then be generally in accordance with the approved plan (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.37). It also notes that applications generally in accordance with the approved plan can be exempted from notice and review, which shifts community scrutiny earlier into the amendment and development plan approval stage rather than later individual permits (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.37).

The implementation pathway was not complete in the source package. Council’s 2024-25 annual reporting says implementation of the Gisborne Futures Structure Plan and Romsey Structure Plan had not begun by the end of 2024-25 because it was awaiting Victorian Government resolution of the protected settlement boundary under the Macedon Ranges Statement of Planning Policy (Source: final-agenda-attachments-council-meeting-22-october-2025-reduced.pdf, p.639). By March 2026, Council was seeking a consultant under contract C26-128 to realise the Economic and Employment Strategy actions of Gisborne Futures, including finalising a proposal to expand the Gisborne Business Park south and east via planning scheme amendment (Source: 25-march-2026-scheduled-meeting-agenda.pdf, p.170).

Movement, Access and Public Realm Dependencies

Access is the first physical dependency. Saunders Road is a VicRoads-operated Road Zone Category 1 road in a 60 metre reserve, and traffic on the section between Station Road and Barry Road increased from 4,550 vehicles per day in 2006 to 5,800 vehicles per day in 2016 (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.14). Barry Road remains the only access point into the existing business park, has an 8.4 metre carriageway in a 20 metre reserve, and carried 2,650 vehicles per day in 2017, with around 10 percent of traffic in either peak period (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.14).

The draft Development Plan therefore requires four linked road interventions: improvements to the Saunders Road-Barry Road intersection, a new one-way service road off Saunders Road, formal realignment of Magnet Lane, and a new north-south Connector Boulevard along the eastern side of the expansion area (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.27). The Saunders Road-Barry Road works include a channelised right-turn lane into Barry Road from the east, retention of the auxiliary left-turn from the west, removal of the painted island, and kerb realignment to provide left and right-turn lanes at the give-way line (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.27). The Connector Boulevard is intended both as an access route and as a landscape buffer to eastern land uses, with a new roundabout at Saunders Road (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.27).

Active transport is a second dependency because the existing estate is physically close to Gisborne Station but poorly connected. The station is about 600 metres from Meek Street in the northern business park, but formal pedestrian access is about 800 metres via Chessy Park Drive (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.14). The draft plan requires shared paths on Barry Road and the Connector Boulevard and asks that the path network be coordinated with links to the existing business park, town centre, station and surrounding neighbourhoods (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.29). Gisborne Futures reinforces this by identifying potential direct pedestrian and cycling links between the business park and Gisborne Station as an active transport opportunity (Source: gisborne-futures-structure-plan-background-report-august-2023.pdf, p.87).

Drainage, Sewer, Water and Utilities

Stormwater is the main staging constraint because the expansion area is divided across existing rural living lots. The draft Development Plan states that a centralised retention and treatment facility will eventually be required to service the expansion area and potentially future development outside the business park (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.31). Until that facility is delivered, independently staged development must provide local retention basins near the low point of each existing site, connected to on-street swale drainage and equal to 5 percent of the lot area (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.31). Underground drainage must handle 10 percent AEP events, retarding systems must handle 1 percent AEP events, and WSUD must be included in all stormwater infrastructure design (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.31).

Sewerage is a hard servicing dependency. The draft plan says a new sewer pump station will be required at the north-east low point of the expansion area, with gravity sewers feeding the pump station and a rising main discharging to the authority main under a Western Water master plan (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.31). The indicative duty flow for the pump station is 30.5 litres per second, and the inlet pipe requirement is a minimum 225 millimetre gravity pipe at a minimum grade of 1 in 200 (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.31). Gisborne Futures later confirms that Greater Western Water’s Gisborne sewerage system will need to respond to increased volumes and a wider distribution of customers from new residential, industrial and open space growth areas (Source: gisborne-futures-structure-plan-background-report-august-2023.pdf, p.99).

Water, energy and communications are also not passive assumptions. The draft plan requires two water supply connection points from Payne Road and Saunders Road, firefighting hydrants on the drinking water system, and notes that Class A recycled water will not be available to the expansion area (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, pp.15, 31). It estimates three additional electricity substations for the existing business park and five further substations for the expansion area, with potential cost-sharing if Powercor capacity augmentation is required (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.31). It also requires pit and pipe infrastructure for telecommunications, with fibre installation by NBN Co. (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.31).

Contributions, Funding and Delivery Risk

The existing Gisborne Development Contributions Plan Overlay is not treated as sufficient for the expansion. The draft Development Plan states that DCPO2 applies to both the existing and proposed future expansion areas and requires commercial and industrial developers to contribute to local planning, roads and drainage in the broader Gisborne area (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.37). It then says DCPO2 does not include the provisions needed to deliver key infrastructure in the Business Park Expansion Area and recommends replacing DCPO2 within the expansion area with a new DCPO schedule (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.37).

The proposed new DCPO schedule would need to apportion design, works and land costs for the Saunders Road-Barry Road intersection, Magnet Lane realignment, Connector Boulevard intersection works, the Connector Boulevard and landscape buffer, and the stormwater retention and treatment facility (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.39). This is the most important unresolved delivery mechanism in the available corpus because the source documents do not provide levy rates, cost estimates, land acquisition assumptions or apportionment methodology for those items (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.39).

The broader DCP context shows that contributions are active but modest at the municipal reporting level. Council reported receiving 165,978 in 2024-25 under the Gisborne Development Plan (2013), 295,541 under the Romsey Development Plan (2012), and no in-kind DCP land, works, services or facilities in 2024-25 (Source: final-agenda-attachments-council-meeting-22-october-2025-reduced.pdf, p.694). That does not disclose whether existing reserves are adequate for the business park works, and it does not answer whether the expansion DCPO would fully fund the required infrastructure or only part-fund it (Source: final-agenda-attachments-council-meeting-22-october-2025-reduced.pdf, p.694; Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.39).

Environmental, Heritage and Interface Constraints

The ecological evidence in the available package is preliminary, not definitive. The draft Development Plan says three of the five expansion properties were inspected: 40 Barry Road, 87 Saunders Road and 111 Saunders Road (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.18). Access was not obtained to 99 Saunders Road or 22 Barry Road before the site walkover, which means the biodiversity assessment did not cover the whole proposed expansion area (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.18). Two small patches of native vegetation were identified, at the south-west corner of 87 Saunders Road and along part of the eastern boundary of 40 Barry Road, and a more detailed biodiversity impact assessment was required at the development planning stage (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.18).

Heritage is a known but under-documented constraint in this corpus. Council’s project page records that 2019 submissions raised potential heritage values at Woiwurrung Cottage, 111 Saunders Road (Source: Gisborne Business Park Development Plan - Macedon Ranges Shire Council). The source package does not include a heritage assessment for Woiwurrung Cottage, any statement of significance, or a planning scheme amendment schedule that explains whether a Heritage Overlay is proposed (Source: Gisborne Business Park Development Plan - Macedon Ranges Shire Council).

The interface question is broader than amenity. Gisborne Futures identifies protection of the business park from encroachment and avoiding land-locking as explicit structure planning considerations (Source: gisborne-futures-structure-plan-background-report-august-2023.pdf, p.6). The draft Development Plan translates this into built form controls, including larger lots and higher-quality landscaped interfaces at Saunders Road and the Connector Boulevard, a 10 metre landscaped buffer along the eastern side of the Connector Boulevard, and fixed building setbacks of 50 metres from Saunders Road and 20 metres from the Connector Boulevard (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, pp.24-25).

Current Status

The current status is in-progress and pre-amendment. Council adopted the Gisborne Futures Structure Plan on 24 July 2024, but 2024-25 reporting states that implementation had not begun by the end of that financial year because the protected settlement boundary was awaiting Victorian Government resolution under the Macedon Ranges Statement of Planning Policy (Source: final-agenda-attachments-council-meeting-22-october-2025-reduced.pdf, pp.639, 664). In March 2026, Council noted contract C26-128 for consultant services to finalise the proposal to expand the Gisborne Business Park south and east via planning scheme amendment, with a budgeted value of $213,972 excluding GST (Source: 25-march-2026-scheduled-meeting-agenda.pdf, p.170; Source: 25-march-2026-scheduled-meeting-minutes.pdf, p.15).

Dependencies

  • Blocks: The initiative blocks coordinated release of the south and east employment expansion land because the current package still requires rezoning, a development coordination control and an infrastructure funding mechanism before subdivision can proceed coherently (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, pp.37-39).
  • Blocked by: The broader Gisborne Futures implementation program was blocked at the end of 2024-25 by unresolved Victorian Government work on the protected settlement boundary under the Macedon Ranges Statement of Planning Policy (Source: final-agenda-attachments-council-meeting-22-october-2025-reduced.pdf, p.639).
  • Informed by: The plan is informed by land use economics, transport and servicing infrastructure, urban design, ecology and biodiversity inputs, but the source package includes only the synthesised draft plan and not the underlying consultant reports for those workstreams (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.5).
  • Implements: The initiative implements the employment-land component of Gisborne Futures Structure Plan and the Economic and Employment Strategy action to prepare a development plan and planning controls for the Gisborne Business Park expansion (Source: final-agenda-attachments-council-meeting-22-october-2025-reduced.pdf, p.940; Source: 25-march-2026-scheduled-meeting-agenda.pdf, p.170).
  • Conflicts with: The main planning tension is between retaining land for long-term employment use and allowing higher-order residential or other uses near Gisborne Station and north of the railway line, because removing rail-adjacent industrial land increases the land requirement south and east of the existing business park (Source: gisborne-futures-economic-and-employment-analysis-urban-enterprise-final-may-2020.pdf, pp.99-101).

Greater Western Water is a key external dependency because the expansion requires potable water connections, sewer pump station planning, and broader sewerage system reconfiguration for new growth areas (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, pp.31-32; Source: gisborne-futures-structure-plan-background-report-august-2023.pdf, pp.98-99). The road interface also requires state transport coordination because Saunders Road is a VicRoads-operated Road Zone Category 1 road and the draft plan requires detailed intersection design to Council and VicRoads requirements (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, pp.14, 27). Powercor, NBN Co. and gas network providers also sit outside Council’s direct control but are necessary for subdivision-scale servicing (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.31).

Gaps in This Analysis

The biggest analytical gap is that the draft Development Plan cites specialist reports by Blair Warman Economics, Cardno, Ethos Urban, Patch Design + Plan, and Paul Kelly and Associates, but those reports are not in the manifest (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, p.5). This limits the ability to test traffic assumptions, intersection capacity, sewer and water modelling, biodiversity offsets, cost estimates and the exact basis for the proposed controls (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, pp.5, 31, 39).

The second gap is statutory. The corpus does not include the planning scheme amendment documentation, draft ordinance, DPO schedule, DCPO schedule, explanatory report, panel material or gazettal material for the business park expansion (Source: 25-march-2026-scheduled-meeting-agenda.pdf, p.170). Until those documents exist or are obtained, the analysis cannot confirm final zone boundaries, notice and review exemptions, contribution rates, land acquisition obligations, or whether the 2018 draft Development Plan will be adopted as written or materially revised (Source: gisborne-business-park-development-plan-draft.pdf, pp.37-39).

The third gap is issue-specific evidence. The source package identifies submissions about traffic, character, urban design, environmental conditions and Woiwurrung Cottage, but it does not include the submissions, officer report from 22 May 2019, heritage assessment, cultural heritage advice, or detailed response matrix (Source: Gisborne Business Park Development Plan - Macedon Ranges Shire Council). Those gaps should be recorded in _gaps because they affect whether the final controls need heritage protection, stronger interface buffers, altered road design, or additional environmental conditions (Source: Gisborne Business Park Development Plan - Macedon Ranges Shire Council).

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