In Gardencity Altona v Grech [2015] VSC 538 Associate Justice Lansdowne refused an application to remove a covenant requiring the main walls of any dwelling or shop on the land to be of brick and/or stone, on the basis that it could not be said that the covenant was obsolete, or that it’s removal would not occasion substantial injury to those with the benefit of the covenant.
No single dwelling covenant attached to the land, and so arguably, only the building materials covenant prevented the applicant from realising his development plans for the land.
Instrumental to her Honour’s reasoning was that the defendants had a genuine preference for the use of brick as a building material.
Her Honour also left open the possibility that if it were shown that removal of the brick or stone restriction would make a taller building less likely that may be a further benefit conferred by the restriction and so further reason why the restriction is not obsolete.
Significantly, the application was made in a neighbourhood found to be predominantly constructed with brick or stone:
142 I find on the whole of the evidence that the buildings in the neighbourhood predominantly have their main walls constructed in brick or stone. As indicated, I refer in this finding to the actual incidence of the use of brick or stone, rendered or exposed, not the visual incidence of exposed brick. By ‘predominantly’ I mean well more than half, and on a broad estimate at least two thirds.
This feature of the case will require close scrutiny for parties wishing to rely on the decision as a precedent.
Of particular interest is that the Court declined to apply the 1956 decision of Jacobs v Greig [1956] VLR 597, often cited as authority for the proposition that a requirement to build out of brick requires ‘double brick’ construction rather than brick veneer:
134 Having regard to Mr McLaughlin’s expert evidence that brick veneer is now an acceptable use of brick in construction, I consider the particular outcome in Jacobs v Greig to be limited to its particular facts and time. On the principle identified in that case, I find that an ordinary resident of Victoria would consider the covenants here in question do not now exclude brick veneer. Accordingly, I find that for this case at least, brick veneer is ‘brick’ for the purposes of the covenants, and like covenants in the area.
This is a welcome development given that double brick is now rarely used in Victoria for reasons of cost and energy efficiency.
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