Ipswich Planning Schemes

Planning Schemes

Historic Planning Scheme documents are comprised of planning schemes, planning scheme policies, planning scheme zoning mapping, by-laws, strategic plans and planning studies.

Early planning schemes and associated amendments up until circa 1990s were published in the ‘Local Government’ section of the Queensland Government Gazette publication.  Today amendments to the current planning scheme are still published in the gazette.

Historically, amendments to these early planning schemes required the planning officers to cut the amended sections from the gazette and insert these amendments as lawful physical addendums (either with glue or tape) into their current version of the planning scheme to ensure their copy of the planning scheme remained up to date.  Revised or consolidated versions of the planning scheme or affected sections were not published during this era to include amendments.  Amendments to zoning maps and acts followed a similar process unless there was a formal amendment of the act by the State government.

Numerous amendments were made to both Ipswich and Moreton Shire planning schemes during the lifespan of the local planning instruments. When locating historic planning scheme documents for a particular date in time, consideration should be given to the version of the planning scheme that was in effect at the time to ensure the planning scheme is inclusive of amendments up to the date of interest. 

It should be noted that regardless of the planning scheme, planning documents only take effect from the date of gazettal or a later nominated date that is published in the gazettal notice.

The current Ipswich local government area has been a result of historic local government amalgamations and boundary realignments.  When researching historic documents, it is important to identify which local government was the relative authority at the time (ie. Willowbank in 1989 formed part of the former Moreton Shire Council). For further information on the history of boundary changes click on the Curated Collection "From Town to City - Boundaries".