The build

Building the new
Planning Assessment Report

This is where Frank and Claude build it. Not a description of a finished thing — the workbench: what we are making, what is made so far, what is being decided now, and what is stuck. Everything on this site is a working draft until it says otherwise.

Objectives

What the new report must achieve. Edit any line, remove it, or press Add. Every change saves.

    Where we are up to

    3 October 2026.

    PieceStateWhat that means
    The report designFirst draft Fourteen pages, built on a real Canberra block with real numbers. Read it and mark it up — the words, the order, what is missing.
    The block lookupWorking An address in; block, section, suburb, area, zone, easements and overlays out, from the ACT cadastre.
    The numbersWorking Site coverage, open space and the secondary residence cap, worked out in square metres for the actual block, each carrying its clause.
    The drawingsTen of twelve Drawn by the machine from ACT map data. Still missing: the Pricefinder floor plan and the drain plan (see Blockages).
    Address in, report outWorking An address in, a report in Support's own template out, in about two minutes. Being proved on the first ten, each beside Support's report for the same block.
    A page per customerAfter that Needs a login first: this site is public, so no customer goes on it until it has one.
    A signed ruleNot needed Frank, 3 October: there is no planner; the machine follows Support's procedure and the rules in force from 1 July 2026, and every figure names its clause.

    Why it exists

    Three reasons, in the order they matter.

    90Planning Assessment Reports booked in the year to September 2026
    2,000a year is the target, from 250–350 customers
    hourseach one takes a person today, by hand

    1. It is the answer a customer actually wants

    Someone standing in their back yard has one question: what can I build here, and how big? Everything else follows from that. The faster and more honestly it is answered, the more likely that conversation continues.

    2. It is how a lead becomes a customer

    The report is not a giveaway. It is the reason a homeowner books a planning assessment meeting, and the meeting is where the design and the price are agreed. A report that arrives in minutes rather than a week keeps that person interested.

    3. Doing it by hand does not scale, and it drifts

    Ninety reports a year can be assembled by hand. Two thousand cannot. And a hand-assembled report carries whatever the writer knew on the day — when a rule changes, every report already issued is quietly out of date and nobody knows which ones.

    The one rule

    It only answers what it can answer from a rule a planner has signed.

    Where something needs judgement, or the information is missing, it says so and offers a meeting. It never guesses, it never rounds a legal number, and it never fills a gap with something plausible.

    This is the rule from Frank's specification, GCONS document 3333, and it is the reason the application is worth building rather than dangerous. A wrong number in a planning report is worse than no number: the customer designs around it, spends money, and finds out at the development application.

    In practice that means a report from this system has three kinds of statement, and you can always tell which you are reading: an answer with its clause, something that needs a person, and something nobody can answer yet.

    What it replaces

    The current report is DID964, a Word template, produced by the DID963 procedure.

    TodayWith this
    One person, several hours, per customerMinutes, from the address
    40-plus pages, with six pages of general ACT planning background before the customer's own answer The answer on page 3; the rule tables moved to the back
    Percentages — "site coverage 40%" Square metres for that block — "364.8 m²"
    Figures typed from websites by hand Read from the ACT cadastre and the rule register, each carrying its clause
    Goes out of date silently when a rule changes Correct the rule once and every future report is right
    A PDF, emailedA PDF and the customer's own page, from one source

    Where the information comes from

    Nothing here is typed in by hand, and nothing is invented.

    WhatSource
    Block, section, suburb, area, zone, easements, overlays The ACT Government cadastre
    The boundary drawing and the buildable envelope Calculated from the cadastre's own coordinates, in metres
    Which boundary is the front, the side, the rear Measured against the ACT road centrelines
    Every planning figure CGFB's planning rule register — 818 rules and 125 elements read from the ACT instruments, each carrying the clause it came from
    Contours, heritage, plumbing ties ACTMapi, the ACT Heritage Register, the Access Canberra public register

    What it will not do

    • Give planning advice. It is an assessment of likelihood, not an approval, and it says so on every copy.
    • Print a figure a planner has not signed. Today that means the front boundary setback on every block — see below.
    • Answer a question about judgement. Whether a design suits a streetscape is an assessment outcome, and the report names it as requiring assessment rather than answering it.
    • Replace the meeting. It is the agenda for it.

    What it is waiting on

    Honestly, because a purpose page that only describes the good version stops being measured.

    Nobody records when a block was created The front boundary setback is read off the table matching the date the block was originally created — 6 m before 18 October 1993, 4 m from 31 March 2008. Nothing CGFB holds records that date: not the cadastre, not a plan set, not GCONS. On one Gordon block the difference is 39 m² of buildable land. Until it is solved, every report carries that gap in writing.
    Waiting onUntil then
    A planner other than Frank who can sign a rule No rule in the register is approved, so nothing can be presented as confirmed
    The report appendix re-read against the 2026 instruments The template still quotes the 2023 specifications, which were renumbered on 1 July 2026
    Checking the output against reports a person wrote and signed There are hundreds in GCONS; the comparison has not been run
    Subdivision and unit title rules Both are answered "not yet" on every report

    How it is built

    PieceWhere
    This applicationIts own site, its own address, nothing tied to GCONS
    The rules, the questions and the sections The Planning Rules register, where planners work
    The block factsRead live from the ACT Government
    The PDF and the web pageOne source, two outputs. They cannot disagree

    The specification is GCONS document 3333, Replacing the PAR Process, 12 September 2026, which sets the first customer report for December.

    How we work on it

    FrankClaude
    Decides what the report says and in what order. Marks up the draft. Answers the questions only he can answer. Builds it, finds the sources, does the reading, and says plainly when something cannot be answered.

    Where the pieces live

    This siteThe report itself, and this page. Its own address, nothing tied to GCONS.
    Planning RulesThe rules, the questions and the sixteen report sections — where planners work and sign.
    GCONSThe specification (document 3333), the current template DID964 and the procedure DID963 that produces it today.