Residents plagued by sleepless nights during the Lumbercube saga have been assured it won't happen again.
In yesterday's full council meeting, Rotorua Lakes councillors voted in favour of Plan Change 4 - proposed changes to noise control.
The changes will see the introduction of a reduced evening noise level, improved reference to New Zealand standards, a new definition of where noise is measured and ensure noise standards are now enforceable.
Plan Change 4 was initiated due to pressure from the Eastside Community Association, which was formed in response to major noise issues caused by Lumbercube mill, and the Rotorua District Residents and Ratepayers Association.
More than 130 noise complaints were made against the Vaughan Rd sawmill within the first nine weeks of it opening in 2015. The mill then closed in June 2016.
Councillor Rob Kent, who is part of the Resource Management Act Policy Committee which dealt with Plan Change 4, presented the changes to council.
"The problems we had with the Lumbercube sawmill highlighted that there were unforeseen deficiencies and enforcement issues within the district plan itself.
"As a result of that, a review of current District Plan noise provisions was undertaken by Malcolm Hunt Associates [noise and environmental consultants] and out of that various changes to the district plan have been proposed by staff to address the issues."
Residents of Rotorua's eastern suburbs staged a protest outside the Lumbercube mill in April 2016. Photo/File
The committee received 19 detailed public submissions.
"On one side we had all submitters trying to ensure there was protection for communities from noisy activities and on the other side of the coin, submissions from businesses concerned their activities would be curtailed if council went too far the other way," Kent said.
After a hearing submitters and the RMA Policy Committee were given the opportunity to question Hunt, of Malcolm Hunt Associates, at length.
Among the three major changes approved by the council, a new reduced evening noise level has been introduced from 7pm to 10pm.
"What that does is it introduces an intermediate noise level between the daytime level and the night-time level," Kent said.
"The impact would not be to curtail any activities taking place in a residential area, the impact would be that businesses in adjoining industrial areas and so on would not be able to start new activities that would exceed these levels in the evening period."
Image 1 of 7: Lumbercube mill has closed this morning. Photo/Stephen Parker
Improvements have also been made to referencing New Zealand standards and a new definition of where noise is measured has been introduced, meaning the standards are now enforceable.
"Previously noise was measured only at the boundary of a site," Kent said.
"Noise can now be measured anywhere on a site and at any height, so the noise standards are now enforceable."
Kent said the other main change was council now had a designated noise chapter in the district plan.
"We've got rid of having separate noise sections in every chapter throughout the district plan and we've got one dedicated noise chapter which has the rules for noise."
When asked by Rotorua mayor Steve Chadwick whether the council had learnt anything from the process, Kent said he believed it had.
"It was summed up by a question from one of the submitters to Malcolm Hunt: Will these changes prevent another Lumbercube from happening, and the answer was 'yes'."
The changes will not affect existing business activities, however new businesses or businesses wanting to change their activity would have to apply for resource consent under the new rules, Kent said.
Rotorua District Residents and Ratepayers Association chairwoman Glenys Searancke said as far as the association was concerned this was a step forward.
"This is a much more understandable and clear set of rules for people considering going into business to understand.
