Bayswater council, one of Perth's more adventurous councils when it comes to verges, has further empowered residents by throwing out the rule book when it comes to nature strips.
Verges are a hot topic in Perth, with a dizzying variety of rules across the city on the allowances for hardstand, synthetic turf and plant height and type.
Few councils have permitted plants over about 50-75 centimetres, or raised garden beds, until now, and food gardens are a rare sight on Perth verges.
But the City of Bayswater has been quietly ripping pages from its rule book and chucking them away with the help of a red-tape reduction working group.
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Mid last year, the council empowered staff to create a simple policy allowing local businesses to put planter boxes outside on their verges without getting special permission.
In November, it completely overhauled its verge policy, reducing it to a simple one-pager that gives residents only the simplest of guidelines to make their verges into productive gardens.
This is quite a feat in a city in which most council documents of this type go for anywhere between five to 20 pages.
It lays down the barest of common-sense rules around sightlines for cars and avoiding hazards, and allows residents to otherwise do what they like.
"You look at Freo, Vincent, any poster child in local government and their policy is full of rules and complicated," said Councillor Chris Cornish.
"These rules and regulations lead to inertia.
"Our guidelines are a one-page document, no red tape, we don't have rules per se. We are putting the responsibility back on the resident. People can go and put a lemon tree out there if they want to.
There is no height restriction in the guidelines, with the council only requesting that sight lines must be considered on parts of the verge close to driveways.
"Every other local government has this height restriction, even though people being allowed to park their cars permanently on a verge makes a mockery of it," Cr Cornish said.
Last week, the council delivered the final flourish: allowing raised planter beds, normally regarded as trip hazards and outlawed across Perth.
The innovation was made possible through negotiations with the Local Government Insurance Scheme in order to create an "acceptable level of risk" which will allow raised garden beds up to a height of 350mm, excluding plants.
The CoB was the only local government to approach the LGIS over the matter, Cr Cornish said.
"You won't find anywhere else in Australia which allows this," he said.
"Our staff had made a mammoth effort, our risk management, finance people.
"Get out there and do it; we won't get in the way."
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