Property 101: New rules for Victorian apartment sizes

Victoria is set for the introduction of new apartment standards to improve high rise amenity and access to air and light, according to The Age.

The new Victorian controls, outlined by state Planning Minister Richard Wynne but still in draft, require apartments have enough daily light and ventilation, with energy and waste efficiency requirement and noise minimisation measure also set out.

The criteria differs from Sydney, who went as far as setting out minimum sizes for apartment, including 50 sqm for one-bedroom apartments and 70 sqm for two bedders.

Victoria's new rules set a minimum standard ceiling height of 2.7 metres, and any habitable room must have direct access to daylight, with the window visible from any point in the room.

"There are a number of apartments that have been built in Melbourne which frankly don't reach in our view a minimum standard," Richard said.

"Buildings that rely on borrowed light, buildings that have poor ventilation, buildings where you can barely put a double bed into the bedroom: this is not the quality of apartments that we should have."

Richard's press conference on the new regime was held at a Lendlease development in Docklands, within a one-bedroom apartment of 48-square metre, less than the Sydney standard.

The decision not to establish Sydney-style minimum sizes was not a "cop-out", Richard said.

"The opportunity in an apartment like this, at 48 square metres, achieves and in fact exceeds the guidelines that we are putting in place.

"We will not be mandating minimum sizes because we want to ensure that good design is a part of this solution."