Westfield Fountain Gate increases security presence, customers warned to adhere to social distancing
Police have warned slack shoppers are in their sights as more stores reopen and crowds get bigger in Melbourne’s retail precincts — but centre administrators are also putting the heat on business owners.
South East
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Westfield Fountain Gate has increased security throughout the centre and warned retailers to limit in-store customer numbers.
In the past few days several security guards and police have been patrolling the shopping centre.
There was a police presence at Chadstone shopping centre last weekend, with police approaching shoppers who were not complying with social distancing measures or sitting at central seating areas to eat.
At Fountain Gate store attendants were busy dealing with shoppers trying to enter stores through their exit points rather than line up.
Scentre Group, who manages Fountain Gate, did not say if security patrolling had been increased, but confirmed its retailers were expected to have signs that clearly displayed how many patrons they could accommodate in their space.
On Westfield’s website, the company said it applied the “highest standard of cleanliness and hygiene across our Westfield centres”.
“We have increased the routine cleaning of frequently-touched hard surfaces, including in car parks. We expect our retail partners to apply the same principles to their cleanliness and hygiene.”
Single-use hand sanitiser is also available at the concierge desks and other locations around Westfield’s centres.
A Victoria Police spokeswoman said police had dedicated regular patrols at both Fountain Gate and Chadstone.
“These patrols are part of our business-as-usual approach to ensuring community safety with a key focus on crime prevention and high visibility policing in high-risk locations,” she said.
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“Whilst the primary purpose of these patrols are to ensure community safety, police can issue infringements to anyone that breaches directions given by the Chief Health Officer.”
The spokeswoman said PSOs had also been deployed to assist with these patrols in some locations as part of its response to the coronavirus pandemic through Operation Shielding.