Covid-19 Maroondah: Eastland, Ringwood Lake Park deserted as lockdown ramps up

Traders at a once bustling shopping precinct in Ringwood fear for the future as the lockdown forces more shop owners to the wall.

An eerie silence has fallen over two of Ringwood’s biggest public gathering hubs as the effects of Melbourne’s ramped-up lockdown restrictions kick in.

Only a handful of customers were in and around Eastland shopping centre, particularly its Town Square precinct, when Leader visited on Tuesday.

The precinct’s Huxtaburger restaurant has closed for good, while Leader understands several restaurants have decided to operate only at night or on weekends.

The state government announced an extension of Melbourne’s lockdown for two weeks on Monday, until at least September 2, and introduced a curfew from 9pm to 5am.

Under the restrictions, only essential services including supermarkets and banks can remain open, and food outlets are restricted to takeaway only.

Town Square traders spoke of their dwindling customer numbers and fears the precinct could become a white elephant if the situation didn’t change in the near future.

Cafe Stazione co-owner Andrew Papaioannou said only he and the cafe’s two other co-owners were working due to low customer numbers.

“We’re not here to make money at the moment, we’re here to keep whatever customers we have,” he said.

“Everyone’s doing the best we can, and the centre has been very helpful, it’s not their fault Covid has happened.

He said the cafe was serving about 30-40 customers a day compared with its usual trade of 200-250 customers.

“It’s depressing, every day there’s no one around … the whole right hand side (of the square) doesn’t open for lunch.

“What we’re missing is workers … everyone’s working from home, and no one is catching the train anymore.”

Brioche by Philip manager Jason Foh said he felt the latest announcement had made people “scared” and kept them away from his cafe and the precinct.

“When there’s a lockdown, it takes a couple of days for people to come out, and when there’s an announcement like last night, there’s less people coming out because they get scared,” he said.

“There needs to be more awareness that if you’re not going to support us now, we’re going to go, and then you won’t have any restaurants to go to in the medium-long term future.

“But we are resilient, I don’t take no for an answer, we have to survive.”

Ringwood shopper Allyson Bell said the centre was the quietest she’d seen it since the pandemic hit, and it was hard to know which shops were open apart from updates on social media.

Ms Bell called for initiatives such as an outdoor market featuring smaller traders from inside the centre to bring more activity to Town Square.

Eastland has previously staged fresh produce and Christmas-themed markets next to the square.

“It would bring more people outdoors and supporting small businesses which would be great, because for some, Coles and Woolworths are all they know,” she said.

“Lots of small local producers are doing it tough at the moment.

“The more people can get outdoors and get fresh air safely, the better, and I think it would be safer than going into a shopping centre.”

Meanwhile, Ringwood Lake Park was largely deserted due to the wet weather and the closure of the park’s playground.

But it didn’t deter Croydon’s Jen Clarke and grandson Tom going for a small walk as they took a breather from homeschooling.

Tom, who is in Year 8 at Ringwood Secondary College, said he wished he was back in class and described his remote learning experience as “endless agony”.

“School is so much more difficult with the tasks and the environment of not being able to immediately get help from your teacher if you need it,” he said.

“It’s really hard to keep kids motivated, and that’s why we’re having a little bit of break,” Jen said.

Eastland general manager Greg Balmforth did not say how many traders at the centre had reached out for rent relief since lockdown six was announced.

But Mr Balmforth said the centre was “committed to supporting their retail partners during this challenging time” and had offered a range of support measures over the past 18 months since the pandemic hit.

“These included a series of bespoke virtual workshops, designed to connect small and medium business owners with the information and tools they needed to leverage the support measures available to them, as well as regular updates on changes or additions to this pool of support measures,” he said.

“We remain committed to working flexibly with all our retail partners to assist them in navigating through this so that the industry recovers as quickly as possible.”