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PORT PHILLIP CONSERVATION COUNCIL INC. Telephone +61393769442, Facsimile 0395891680 warfej@bigpond.com A0020093K Victoria www.vicnet.net.au/~phillip ABN 46 291 176
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The Officer-in-Charge Planning Department Wyndham City Council WERRIBEE VIC 3030 Dear Sir or Madam, Submission on EES on
“Wyndham Cove” Port Phillip Conservation
Council Inc, a federation of sixteen conservation organizations around Retrograde
and Inappropriate Transformation:
Port Phillip Bay is undoubtedly the major remaining largely intact natural
feature of the Melbourne metropolitan region, which gives its seascapes and
landscapes very high value to the large number of people in that broad
region. A significant element of the strong appeal and viability of the
region is dependent on the continued existence of a healthy contrast between
the increasingly crowded and busy developed metropolis and the far less
developed and more natural areas of the Bay’s foreshores and waters. The concept of the
Bay’s foreshores and waters remaining as Crown land, held in trust in
perpetuity for general undisturbed use by the public, was an early foundation
of the social compact that has made Melbourne’s coastal areas so
popular and cherished. This concept needs to be maintained. The proposed transformation
would effect such a huge and quite discordant change to the existing setting
that it must be recognized as totally dismissive of and insensitive to the
existing qualities of the public land and sea there. The EES uses a familiar
developer’s ploy when it attempts to denigrate the present foreshore
reserve by stating, in the Executive Summary, that the foreshore reserve is
“significantly degraded”, with a “rough unconstructed
track”, “extensive weed infestation”, “dumped
rubbish”, and “small areas of Coast Saltbush”. Those
characteristics are unfortunately quite common along much of the public land
along the coast of south-eastern Massive
Development Ought Not Seep Up To or Into Port Phillip:
The Victorian Coastal Strategy and Victoria’s planning system has
recognized, in the public interest, and for posterity, that development that
is not coastal-dependent should not intrude up to the coast or into the sea.
A major appeal of Port Phillip is the lack of intrusive development on its
edges or generally visible from its waters. The proposed five-storey
structure would be exceptionally intrusive on the Wyndham coastline, which is
naturally low and flat. In certain municipalities
around Port Phillip the Planning Schemes apply strict two-storey height
limits within a considerable distance of the coast, e.g. Bayside
City Council’s Building Height Control Overlay – Coastal (DDO1),
to preserve the coastal ambience (found only on the coast!). Planning Schemes
also prohibit devices to circumvent such controls, such as “roof
decks”. Green Wedge legislation has also been most properly used to
keep coastal areas free of non-coastal intrusions. There is no good reason to
regard the Wyndham coastline as a dumping ground for oversized and 5-storey
developments that would not be contemplated at other sites around Port
Phillip.
EES is a
Shameless Apologia Extolling a Fantasy and Caring Little for Existing Values: Port
Phillip Conservation Council Inc. recommends that the Environment Effects
Statement be regarded as a document that focuses almost entirely on a
hypothetical replacement environment and avoids acknowledging that the
commercial and quasi-industrial complex that would be created if the scheme
succeeded would utterly dominate the natural and modest coastal environment
presently existing, which is agreeable, restful and affordable to all. The EES process
unfortunately does not include comparisons with a more benign alternative
scenario in which the public sector could plan and create, using existing
land and further land publicly acquired, a fine coastal park that would cater
to the future larger population expected on the large areas further inland,
leaving the coastal area free of the inevitably damaging residential,
commercial and quasi-industrial development proposed. Amendment
C71 to the Wyndham Planning Scheme:
The unprecedented use of the Planning Scheme to legitimize and facilitate the
excessive transformation of large areas of foreshore and sea at Werribee South for a huge marina-cum-residential
development is to be deplored. It is recommended that the amendment be
abandoned in favour of the more environmentally
protective types of amendment referred to above. Support
for Western Region Environment Centre Submission: Port
Phillip Conservation Council Inc. generally supports the submission lodged by
the Western Region Environment Centre. Yours sincerely, Geoffrey Goode President Port Phillip Conservation
Council Inc. cc. Hon. John Thwaites MLA, Hon. Rob Hulls MLA, Hon. Phil Honeywood MLA, Mr Ted Baillieu MLA, MLCs for |
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