An artist's impression of the plan for 26-56 Queens Parade, North Fitzroy. Credit:FloodSlicer Hundreds of residents attended from the heavily gentrified suburb, which has a median house price of $1.25 million. The proposed apartment building would have properties selling from $450,000 up to $2.5 million and is designed to have three levels on its borders facing houses. But it rises to 16 levels in its centre – and has infuriated the former industrial site's neighbours. Yarra Council received almost 500 objections, and a resident group, Protect Fitzroy North's Skyline, is highly active.

The site at 26-56 Queens Parade, North Fitzroy, where almost 500 apartments are planned by developer Gurner. But because the council failed to make a decision on the project the developer took its proposal to the state planning tribunal. On Tuesday the council pledged to hire senior lawyers to fight the plan. It also asked the state government to introduce immediately a six-storey height limit on that site. Fitzroy North residents Anne Coveny and Glen McCallum, and children Liam and James, who are objecting to the proposed development, which will dwarf their miners cottage. Credit:Chris Hopkins The large development has prompted a wider response from councillors, who also asked Planning Minister Richard Wynne to cap development in "mixed use zones" throughout Yarra at 13 metres – about four levels.

It also wants him to compel developers who want to build on strip shopping centres to set projects back at least 10 metres from the street – instead of the current two or three metres. "I don't accept it's a NIMBY thing," Amanda Stone, the mayor of Yarra and a member of the Greens, said of the push to lock down four levels across the municipality. "These are genuinely felt concerns by people who have lived here for a long time." Cr Stone said that the reaction by councillors on Tuesday night was not a knee-jerk response to furious residents. "This is a head of steam that has been building a long time," she said. Cr Stone said the community accepted growth, but wanted to simultaneously protect itself against inappropriate development. "I don't think anyone is saying pull up the drawbridge, and I am not saying as mayor 'put up a wall around Yarra'," Cr Stone said.

Tim Gurner said his company had followed due process in its application. He said his company spoke with Yarra Council officers and that the council's heritage consultants had deemed the project acceptable. Mr Gurner, who appeared at the packed council meeting on Tuesday, said he had been "very concerned and disappointed" with the council's actions. And he warned that Yarra's request to the planning minister to enforce a 10-metre setback from the street would hurt the entire area. "Many potential sites will become unfeasible to develop," he said. But one resident whose house backs onto the proposed Gurner development said he had been "blown away" by the support from councillors, who voted unanimously to seek the four-level limit more widely in Yarra. "It was more than we expected," said Glen McCallum.

Mr Wynne said that he would listen his constituents, but also said that the council had "left our community in the lurch because they never put in planning controls for Queens Parade". The council started a structure plan for the strip in 2008 but it was never signed off by the state government. "Yarra Council needs to do strategic planning without punting their responsibilities to the state," Mr Wynne said. The Grattan Institute's John Daly has studied the impact on residents where highly gentrified areas locked out "inappropriate" development. Loading He said that a four-level height limit would be inappropriate in areas where medium-rise development up to 10 levels might be possible.

But he said it was essential existing residents were not hurt by development. "In a lot of places you don't need more than 13 metres [height]," he said.