This was published 5 months ago
Our island home: Phillip Island and its residents, both human and non-human
The island’s population is booming and tourism surging. Can its precious wildlife and environment be protected? It’s a delicate dance.
Newhaven Marina at Phillip Island. Credit: Joe Armao
When Ian Christensen started as a tattooist in the early 2000s, it seemed almost every aspiring ink artist wanted to be in Melbourne’s gritty inner suburbs.
He too felt the lure of the big city and its opportunities when he left his Latrobe Valley home town of Traralgon as a teenager for a career in needle and ink.
After training with a studio in St Kilda and stints overseas, Christensen moved to a rental property in Brunswick and worked at another parlour nearby for 12 years, establishing a reputation and customer base. But when it came time to buy a house near work, Christensen and his partner were quickly priced out.
So, when his partner suggested the relatively affordable Phillip Island about seven years ago, he kept an open mind.
Tattoo artist Ian Christensen is part of the changing face of Phillip Island.Credit: Joe Armao
They bought a three-bedroom house in Cowes, the island’s commercial and residential centre, settling into what Christensen thought would be a quiet coastal life. Instead, they found a flourishing cafe culture and arts scene, and joined a young, entrepreneurial community trying their hand at creative new businesses.
“It’s not pure rural living, but has all the benefits of that and the niceties of the city,” Christensen says. “And then Melbourne is only 90 minutes away. It’s the perfect place.”
After three years commuting between Cowes and Melbourne for work, Christensen rented a small warehouse in Newhaven on the island intending to open a tattoo studio that could rival the quality of those in Melbourne’s inner suburbs.
Cowes during the winter holidays. Credit: Joe Armao
Business has since boomed. He is now finalising plans to start a small tattoo business in Cowes. Meanwhile, his partner found a job at Phillip Island’s iconic tourism drawcard – the penguin parade – in logistics. She also worked temporarily as a stylist on reality television program The Block, on the Nine network, owner of this masthead.
They are among a growing community on Phillip Island, where the population has almost doubled from about 7000 at the 2001 census to about 13,800 in 2021. While the COVID-19 pandemic kicked along the pre-existing population trend, planners on the Bass Coast expect the island will continue to attract new residents.
Phillip Island is known for its stunning beaches – from the spectacular and treacherous open coastline at Cape Woolamai to the placid waters of Western Port at Cowes.
It is a place of natural wonder where penguins emerge from the ocean at dusk and captivate crowds with their comical procession up the shore. Whales migrate across the coastline in winter and fur seals gather in one of the biggest colonies in Australia. For more than 150 years the island has lured holidaymakers creating beloved summer memories in the sand and surf.
During summer Phillip Island’s population swells. Beaches fill with people, main roads are choked and parking near the centre of Cowes can feel almost impossible. The Australian Motorcycle Grand Prix, one of regional Victoria’s biggest events, brings yet more crowds.
So, can Phillip Island balance the protection of its delicate natural environment with the increasing demand for housing and the seasonal population surges?
For Christensen, Phillip Island’s tourism economy has been crucial for business. End-of-season football trips, bucks parties or getaways with friends provide reliable income. “Girls’ trips will end up with a little wine tattoo – something they can remember their trip by,” he says.
Christensen concedes a sense of relief rolls over the island’s permanent population when the summer crowds recede, and they have the beaches and cafes largely to themselves.
“In summer it can feel like you’re living in a Melbourne suburb, it’s so busy.”
Some residents resent the crowds. But Christensen believes many young people can now see a future for themselves on Phillip Island because its growing population and tourism industry have created more career opportunities.
His former apprentice and now co-worker, Jack Montgomery, grew up on Phillip Island but spent four years in Melbourne studying film and television at RMIT before deciding to become a tattoo artist. He returned to the island to work for Christensen.
“Growing up I always resented the island a little bit. It always seemed like people got stuck here,” Montgomery says. “When I left for Melbourne it made me realise how beautiful it is.”
Crowds at the penguin parade. Credit: Eddie Jim
Montgomery now lives on the main street in Cowes and relishes the peak holidays. “The atmosphere is very cool when there’s so many people walking around at night.”
Phillip Island’s summer surge is a tradition so old it predates European arrival. Phillip Island and District Historical Society secretary Pamela Rothfield says the island’s traditional owners, the Bunurong people, who refer to the island as Millowl, crossed over from the mainland in canoes during the warmer parts of the year.
“They had a bounty of wonderful foods – shellfish and mutton birds,” Rothfield says.
In 1842, the McHaffie family took out a lease on the entire island which allowed them to graze sheep before it was subdivided in 1868.
Two years later, the Isle of Wight was the first hotel to open on Phillip Island as the tourism industry took hold with a ferry connecting Cowes to the mainland. Then the bridge from San Remo was completed in 1940, bringing easy car access.
But Rothfield says motorsport was already well established with the first car race held in 1928 when local roads were closed off to stage the event. Even before that race, penguins were attracting crowds of people who would sit on the sand as the aquatic birds waddled past.
“The things that brought people to the island are still the same today,” Rothfield says.
Tourism now draws visitors from across Australia and the world. Visitation is rebounding after the industry was hammered during the pandemic, reaching 1,031,664 in the 2023-24 financial year, compared to 1,109,790 in 2018-19. Figures from Destination Phillip Island indicate that the tourism spend on the island and broader Bass Coast was $753 million in the 2022 calendar year.
Phillip Island Nature Parks tourism general manager Mark Anderson says the island is among the most visited places in Victoria, with the penguins alone attracting more than 709,500 people in the past financial year.
“Rarely do you see nature and community existing so close together, with natural wonders wherever you look,” he says.
Phillip Island also acts as an economic magnet for people living in the wider region, including Courtney Shepherd, who opened the Seaside Provider, a cafe and clothing boutique at Newhaven, in April.
She lives nearby in the small town of Bass, making the short drive to work every day. Although she, too, benefits from tourism, Shepherd says permanent residents are her core customers.
Courtney Shepherd opened her business Seaside Provider in April. Credit: Joe Armao
“We know everyone by name,” she says.
The development sector is seeking to cash in on demand for tourism with various projects planned totalling hundreds of millions of dollars. Among them is the $130 million Isle of Wight redevelopment.
Overlooking the beach in Cowes, the seven-storey hotel will include 159 rooms as well as bars, restaurants and cafes, a rooftop pool and an events space.
President of the Island Voice community association, Peter Paul, says the project is long overdue. The previous building at the site burnt down in mysterious circumstances in 2010. Paul was a councillor at the Bass Coast Shire when it approved the development on the site. He says its position by a north-facing beach makes it unique.
“This site has so much to offer the community and people of Victoria.”
Paul hopes the building will kick off a “foreshore renaissance”. While he supports development on the island, he also fears it has reached a tipping point. Parking is an intractable problem and the Isle of Wight development must be carefully planned to ensure it does not exacerbate the peak period traffic problems, Paul says.
Phillip Island’s Peter Paul at the site of the Isle of Wight hotel. Credit: Penny Stephens
“You should see it during Christmas, Easter and long weekends. It’s only going to get worse. There’s no doubt about that.”
Paul believes pressure on community infrastructure remains a constant worry. He says sporting clubs are running out of space and need new grounds to accommodate the increasing junior numbers.
Healthcare on the island remains another serious concern. In 2008, the private not-for-profit Warley Hospital closed on Phillip Island after 85 years of operation, leaving the community without an acute care facility.
“People were shattered,” Paul says.
He helped lead a campaign to build another hospital at Cowes and the state government committed funding to the project in 2018. Construction is scheduled for completion early next year.
Bass Coast Shire mayor Clare Le Serve and chief executive Greg Box at the pier in Cowes. Credit: Joe Armao
“I always said the people of Phillip Island and Cowes are entitled to what the people of the rest of Victoria had.”
Bass Coast Shire chief executive Greg Box insists Phillip Island has the required infrastructure to serve the community, including the soon-to-be-completed hospital and sufficient school capacity. But he agrees traffic problems continue to plague the island, and is calling for some creative solutions.
Without a train connection and limited bus services, Box says the island is too car-dependent. He wants the Victorian Department of Transport and Planning to trial a minibus service that residents and visitors can use on-demand, much like a communal ride-sharing option.
“That’s the challenge for us to try and work out ways of moving people around without necessarily the need for just their single vehicle all the time,” he says. “We don’t have all the answers to that.”
Box believes the island can accommodate more residential development in existing urban areas rather than spreading beyond those boundaries. Phillip Island remains far more affordable than Melbourne with the median price for a three-bedroom house in Cowes about $750,000, compared to just over $1 million for a house in Melbourne.
Box supports greater density with environmentally friendly designs but does not want high-rise developments. He also wants to see a better balance between short-stay accommodation and long-term rental properties.
“We need short-stay housing for the economy, but we don’t want it to dominate the local market.”
Box is encouraged by environmental initiatives taken by past governments, including the property buyback of a housing estate at Summerland Beach where penguins nest. In the mid-1980s the state government launched a $10.5 million scheme to buy about 180 houses. The scheme concluded in 2010 and the land is now managed by the Phillip Island Nature Parks.
“The buyback in Summerlands shows that humans have the capacity to reverse things they’ve done in relation to nature.”
The farmland in Ventnor at the centre of Matthew Guy’s controversial planning decision. Credit: Eddie Jim
Bass Coast Shire mayor Clare Le Serve insists people move to Phillip Island for its green open space and coastline, and she says protecting these natural features is crucial for its economic future, which is so closely tied to environmental tourism.
“As we grow as a nation those natural environments are shrinking,” she says.
The Phillip Island community has a history of resisting intensive development. Phillip Island Conservation Society president Greg Johnson helped fight off a proposed project in 1988 that would have involved excavating Saltwater Creek on the border of Cowes and Ventnor to make way for about 280 dwellings.
“We would have lost all of Saltwater Creek,” Johnson says. “The whole of the north coast of the island would have been continuous urban sprawl.”
He doubts whether another residential project of that size would be successful today, although developers have since tried elsewhere on the island.
In 2011, then planning minister Matthew Guy rezoned 24 hectares of farmland for housing at Ventnor, enraging residents who launched a protest campaign that culminated with the intervention of pop star Miley Cyrus, who tweeted her opposition. Her former boyfriend Liam Hemsworth’s family lived nearby at the time.
While the government ultimately abandoned plans to allow development, Johnson still wants stronger guarantees that Phillip Island’s rural land and natural environment will be protected.
Cowes has grown significantly in the past 20 years. Credit: Joe Armao
The state government has committed to declaring the Bass Coast a distinctive area and landscape, which will determine where development can occur and the areas requiring protection. Johnson wants the government to contain urban development within current boundaries as part of its distinctive areas declaration.
A spokeswoman for the state government says it is working with the council and community to ensure it delivers the homes, health services and infrastructure investment on Phillip Island in the right locations.
“We know Phillip Island is one of Victoria’s most stunning locations and a busy tourist destination – planning will take into consideration the needs of the community and the environment,” she says.
Seven years after leaving Melbourne, Ian Christensen has no regrets about moving to Cowes. He still loves spending time in the city.
But Christensen feels a sense of peace driving home alongside the expansive waters of Western Port – whether its surface is still and reflective or wind chopped – before crossing over the bridge from the mainland.
“When I see that, I feel we did make the right choice,” he says. And then he cannot wait to get back to his island home.
Start the day with a summary of the day’s most important and interesting stories, analysis and insights. Sign up for our Morning Edition newsletter.