Consultation open on engineering requirements for land divisions

Final consultation is now open on a design standard for new housing developments that aims to streamline assessment processes and enable more homes to be built faster across South Australia’s growth areas.

Set to be the state’s first design standard, it provides technical guidance and builds on existing planning rules to deliver more transparent and consistent design standards, construction specifications and infrastructure costs for land division.

The draft Design Standard 1 – Engineering Requirements for Land Division specifies requirements for:

• road and pavement design
• stormwater design
• stormwater quality
• earthworks
• service infrastructure
• street landscaping, including trees.

It applies to land division for large residential developments in Master Planned Zones, including constructing a public road or infrastructure that will become council property.

This is the second stage of consultation, following a comprehensive review of the initial draft engineering design standard, technical manual and standard drawings released for consultation in May 2025.

Updates and amendments to the draft technical manual and standard drawings have been made. However, their role in the assessment process has been limited to being one of the ways to satisfy mandatory conditions and provide guidance to best practice land division design and construction.

Aspects such as climate resilient design and active transport have also been moved from the design standard and included in the technical manual to ensure updates can be made easily, in-line with contemporary best practice.

Supporting amendments to the general planning regulations and Practice Direction 12 – Conditions are also proposed.

Because significant changes have been made, and due to the importance of ensuring the engineering design standard effectively supports timely and efficient land division assessment and housing delivery, the State Planning Commission is seeking further feedback on the updated documents.

An online information session will be held on Wednesday, 29 April, for community to find out more about the proposed changes.

Consultation on the final draft engineering design standard for land division closes on 21 May 2026.

Visit the YourSAy website for more information about the proposed changes, online information session and how to share your feedback.