Arthurs Seat Eagle and Rosebud pool among biggest community battles on Mornington Peninsula
Whether it’s changing the name of a suburb to help locals feel better or saving bees from pesticide, Mornington Peninsula people aren’t afraid to stand up in a bid to force change. Here’s some of their more memorable campaigns.
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Capel Sound was once plain old Rosebud West and scientists once planned to spray pesticide from Rosebud to Portsea – but campaigning locals stood up and forced change.
Here’s a look back at the controversial ideas that got you hot under the collar.
ARTHURS SEAT EAGLE
An ambitious bid to bring a Victorian legend back to life faced strong opposition from environmentalists and locals.
The original Arthurs Seat chairlift was a draw card for the region attracting close to 100,000 visitors a year in its heyday.
It was closed and decommissioned after a series of mishaps including the collapse of a pylon in 2003, an injury to an elderly woman whose carriage slid into another carriage in 2004, and the trapping of eight people after a mechanical failure in 2006.
Despite the frightening incidents the attraction was sorely missed and in 2009 Parks Victoria called for “new modern infrastructure”.
Tenders were called in October 2009 and Skylift was successful.
The consortium, led by former Australian of the year Simon McKeon, proposed to replace the ski-style life with 24 Swiss-made gondolas that each held eight passengers for a 15-minute journey up or down Arthurs Seat.
The plan was not popular with everyone and lobby group Save Our Seat was formed to fight the $20 million proposal
In addition to concerns over the impact the attraction would have on the landscape, SOS also feared it was a bushfire risk.
Environmentalists and locals held a day of action on June 1, 2014 in a bid to convince Mornington Peninsula Shire council to reject the proposal.
The protest included a memorial service for the Arthurs Seat Tower and featured a song written for the occasion by Magic Dirt singer Adalita and Charlie Owen from the Beasts of Bourbon.
Schoolchildren created a mock cemetery in the Summit Parkland using 100 chairs. They also named the trees earmarked for removal and gave them eyes.
The creative approach didn’t sway the council and the project was approved later that month with 70 conditions.
Save Our Seat went on to challenge the decision at VCAT but the tribunal ruled in favour of the council.
The Arthurs Seat Eagle officially opened on December 3, 2016.
After operating successfully for more than three years there was yet another twist in the tale when the Eagle was placed into administration on Monday, March 23, 2020.
Mr McKeon said the attraction had “no debts” and would be “up and running again” once coronavirus restrictions eased.
SAVE THE BEES
When news broke of a plan to spray parts of the Mornington Peninsula with insecticide in the battle against the spread of a flesh-eating ulcer locals were furious.
The experiment was an attempt to reduce the mosquito population and test a theory that the insects were partially responsible for a spike in Buruli ulcer cases in the region.
As part of the Melbourne University Doherty Institute-led Beating Buruli mosquito control study trial, sections of the southern peninsula from Rosebud to Portsea would be sprayed with synthetic pyrethroid (SP) pesticide every four to six weeks during mosquito breeding season (December 2019 to April 2020).
People with properties in the area earmarked for the program were worried about environmental and health impacts, and angry they weren’t consulted.
Even those who had developed ulcers themselves were against the plan.
A petition against spraying was started on July 15, 2019 and garnered more than 4000 signatures in less than a day.
Petition creator and Save the Bees Australia founder Simon Mulvany said the experiment could “potentially risk residents’ health and decimate the indigenous bee population” by attempting to kill mosquitoes with SP neurotoxins — “effectively industrial-strength Mortein”.
Within a month 15,000 people had signed the petition, southern peninsula properties were displaying No Spray Signs and a community meeting was called to discuss the project.
More than 350 people packed the Rye Civic Hall on Saturday August 10, 2019 and at least 50 more were turned away.
Anger over the plan and the lack of consultation grew as it was revealed that three streets in Rye had already been sprayed earlier in the year to fine tune the trial process.
Bee keeper Will Holmes said he was forced to dump 60kg of honey because of the Rye pilot fearing it was contaminated.
The public pressure forced Mornington Peninsula Shire to press pause on the trial.
In mid-August it voted unanimously to hold off until more information on alternative ways to control the mosquito population was available.
By November the trial was cancelled altogether and Department of Human Services Victoria chief health officer Dr Brett Sutton had conceded the Rye pilot shouldn’t have taken place.
ROSEBUD WEST NAME CHANGE
A campaign to help locals to “feel good about where they lived” led to an entire suburb being wiped off the map.
The movement to change Rosebud West to Capel Sound began in July 2015 after the suburb was identified as an area of disadvantage by the Dropping off the Edge survey.
Rosebud West residents decided they needed a new moniker to help rid the coastal town of its stigma.
Longtime Rosebud West resident Terry Wright, who started the push for the name, said
‘Rosebud West’ tended to “ruin the poetry” of the place names on the peninsula.
“How much better would the poetry of the peninsula be if it was Capel Sound instead?” Mr Wright said
The lobby group interviewed 252 people in eight residential areas and two business areas about the name change.
Mr Wright said residents were five-to-one in favour of the name change, and businesses along Point Nepean Rd were eight-to-one in favour, with opinion divided in the industrial estate.
The small but determined group took their proposal to Mornington Peninsula Shire and won support for the name change after the council conducted another survey.
That survey of 5600 Rosebud West ratepayers and residents revealed that 1065 of the 1902 responses (56 per cent) supported the change.
The Office of Geographic Names then approved the request in September 2016 despite the State Government receiving 40 objections to the plan.
The move certainly paid dividends for homeowners as property prices in the newly named suburb jumped by $100,000 in just two years.
ROSEBUD POOL
There will be many sighs of relief when the long awaited Rosebud Aquatic Centre opens later this year.
The pool was initially intended for the foreshore at Rosebud and the concept had Mornington Peninsula Shire council approval and a range of design options to consider.
But at an explosive meeting in September 2014 the council voted 5-4 to tear up those plans and go back to the drawing board.
The use of the Rosebud foreshore for the development, which is Crown land, was also repealed.
The council’s decision coincided with a sitting councillor being found guilty of a conflict of interest over the proposal.
Cr Graham Pittock was found guilty of two offences at Frankston Magistrates’ Court after he voted on the Southern Peninsula Aquatic Centre proposal while owning a Dromana gym 10km away.
The Local Government Inspectorate received an anonymous complaint in February 2012 that the councillor was voting on the proposal, which includes a gym, and he was charged in March 2013.
Locals didn’t give up on their dream of a public pool in Rosebud and the campaign, led by Betty Preston continued.
Ms Preston was adamant that a complex with a 50m pool was essential.
In February 2017 she rallied a group of supporters to attend a council meeting armed with beach towels and questions about when the project would be back on the agenda.
Ms Preston kept the questions coming and by August that year the council had voted to start a business case to investigate an aquatic centre on council-owned land adjoining the municipal offices in Besgrove St
The business case considered a 25m or 50m indoor pool or a 50m outdoor pool.
A community survey which found 94 per cent of respondents supported a 50m indoor pool helped to convince the council to push forward with that option.
The project received a major cash splash of $5 million from the Federal Government in July 2018 and within 12 months construction had started.
The complex was expected to be finished later this year.
CRIB POINT FLOATING GAS TERMINAL
The sleepy suburb of Crib Point was thrust into the national economic spotlight in 2017 when
it was chosen as the preferred location for a new terminal importing gas from interstate and international markets.
The $250 million pipeline was expected to create more than 40 jobs and dozens more in construction.
Work on the AGL base was expected to begin late in 2017 and be ongoing until 2025.
The announcement was seen by many as a much-needed boost for local businesses and an answer to the high unemployment rate in Hastings and Crib Point.
But not all were pleased.
Prominent peninsula environmentalist Jenny Warfe urged residents to fight the plan which she said would threaten the Western Port ecosystem.
Ms Warfe said she feared a “heavy industrial use” at the Crib Point jetty site would degrade the environment.
About 100 people attended a meeting called by the Save Western Port – No AGL Gas group in May, 2018.
Residents voted to reject the plan due to the risk of a “devastating fire — explosion event” and take their fight to parliament.
The following month Premier Daniel Andrews promised the project would be put under the microscope.
In October 2018 the government announced an Environmental Effects Statement (EES) would be carried out on the controversial proposal.
The EES was submitted to the Department of Environment Land Water and Planning for “adequacy assessment” earlier this month.
If the project goes ahead it will involve a floating storage terminal that would stretch almost 300m — nearly twice the length of the MCG turf and receive deliveries of LNG shipped from overseas.
The terminal would also be used for regasification — the process of returning liquefied gas to natural gas for regular use.
Gas would then be shipped through a new pipeline to Pakenham, on Melbourne’s southeastern fringe, for distribution elsewhere.
DROMANA QUARRY
Environmentalists are once again digging in for a fight to preserve pristine bushland in the Mornington Peninsula hinterland.
This time the battle is over a bid for a huge quarry near Arthurs Seat State Park.
The RE Ross Trust wants to reopen and expand the old Pioneer Quarry, clearing 38 ha of native vegetation, creating a 190m deep pit and extracting granite for up to 70 years.
Peninsula Preservation Group president Mark Fancett said the Hillview Quarry proposal was grossly inappropriate and the area was too precious to lose.
In March 2020 more than 300 people joined a community protest against the plan and a further 8000 people signed a petition objecting to the proposal.
“This is not a little quarry; it would be as big as Melbourne’s Royal Botanic Gardens and they want to bulldoze the last big bushland area on the Mornington Peninsula to do it,” Dr Fancett said.
Instead locals want the State Government to buy the Dromana land earmarked for the quarry and roll it into the existing Arthurs Seat State Park.
They also called for all commercial operations to be banned from the park.
Hillview’s website states that the Boundary Rd project would “generate the revenue needed to ensure the work of the RE Ross Trust continues well into the future”.
It claimed the granite to be quarried was needed for current and future infrastructure projects across Victoria.
Seven years ago residents opposed the conversion of the existing quarry to a rubbish tip – also mooted by Hillview Quarries.
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The new quarry proposal is subject to an Environmental Effects Statement. Mornington Peninsula Shire will have an opportunity to provide input but the Planning Minister Richard Wynne will have the final say.