Thank you for your input so far with the development of the draft Nature Strip Guidelines development. The second round of Nature Strip Guidelines Community Consultation is now complete.

We have reviewed and considered the feedback from the first round of community consultation which ran from December 21, 2021 to February 22, 2022. In addition, we have benchmarked 39 other nature strip guidelines, received independent arboricultural advice for planting under trees and have carried out a mapping exercise looking at parking configurations, footpath widths and nature strip locations.

Using this information we have revised the draft nature strip guidelines. The main changes include:

• Changing the tone of the guidelines to be more supportive and encouraging, and promoting gardening for benefits to biodiversity, permeability and community connectedness
• Reducing setbacks from kerbs and footpaths, and making different setback provisions for angle and parallel parking to allow more space for planting
• Encouraging the use of grass-replacement groundcovers in setback areas
• Reducing setbacks from tree trunks in nature strips in accordance with independent arboricultural advice (The planting setbacks from kerbs, footpaths and driveways and around trees cannot be reduced any further.)
  
• Providing gardening advice including turf removal, garden bed preparation and plant species recommendations
• Adding a quick 1 page checklist to give an overview of the guidelines

We are also considering how we can further support nature strip gardening through redeveloping information on the Council website and providing other resources.

Along with the revised draft nature strip guidelines, the summary report from the first round of consultation, benchmarking, independent arborist report and the ways we have addressed the consultation feedback can be found in the document library.

The Nature Strip Guidelines will be considered by Councillors at a Council Meeting on 3 August 2022.

The report will be available from Friday on our website. The website also has information on how you can request to speak at the meeting. Here is the link - Council meetings - City of Port Phillip

Greening Port Phillip - Council's Urban Forest Strategy

Nature strips are a small part of our urban forest. We will soon be commencing work to update Greening Port Phillip, Council’s Urban Forest Strategy, which will provide opportunities for the community to have their say about how we grow and manage Port Phillip’s urban forest.

We are also working to map opportunities for de-paving to create more permeable surfaces and space for nature strip gardening.

Keep an eye out on Divercity for details.