Key legal question
Whether the appellant had standing to challenge the department’s non-entry decision
Extracted holding
No. He did not show a current, practical, personal interest; his concern was essentially the correct application of the law and a general interest in a permitting procedure.
Extracted reasoning
Under § 12 Abs. 1 VRG, standing requires special affectedness and a protectable interest. The appellant lived outside the affected area and could not demonstrate a concrete advantage from a successful appeal. A renewed building-permit procedure would only recreate participation rights that had already existed during the public planning stages. He had moreover already transferred the relevant parcels to the municipality by prior court settlement, so no current interest remained.