A historic beachside pub in St Kilda that has been boarded up since the one-punch death of cricket legend David Hookes 20 years ago will reopen after receiving the green light from Port Phillip Council on Wednesday night.
Almost a year after the Beaconsfield Hotel’s owners submitted a permit application to council, six of the eight newly elected councillors voted in favour of granting a permit for the 143-year-old building to begin trading, despite receiving 186 community objections.
The Beaconsfield Hotel in St Kilda West.Credit: Paul Jeffers
Residents had flagged concerns about noise, anti-social behaviour and increased traffic caused by the reopening of the pub. The reopening proposal received one letter of support.
Mayor Louise Crawford said that while she appreciated residents’ concerns, “there are lots of venues that do exist in residential areas, not only in the City of Port Phillip, but in other areas, and they are managed and very popular for the locals”.
Initial plans to operate seven days a week until 1am with a maximum capacity of 590 patrons caused alarm among locals. The accepted permit reduced capacity to 400 people and will only allow the bar to open until 11.30pm on Friday and Saturday. The outside courtyard will close by 10pm in summer and 9pm during the rest of the year.
Councillor Rod Hardy, whose ward area covers the pub, said he believed enough conditions had been put in place to limit the impact on residents.
The pub owners will spend $250,000 to reopen the pub.Credit: Paul Jeffers
“The hours of operation have been reduced … the patron numbers have also been reduced. The acoustic barrier noise wall is to be erected, and the restoration repairs and external painting of the building give us an opportunity to bring a fading heritage building back to life,” he said.
Councillor Serge Thomann, who voted against the permit alongside councillor Beti Jay, said he would have voted in favour if the application was for a pub that served food or a restaurant.
“I have a problem [when] it is just a bar. Four hundred people in a bar is a big bar,” he said. However, on Thursday a Port Phillip council spokesman confirmed to The Age that the permit would allow for the venue to serve food.
The proposal passed with an amendment that bans rubbish pick-ups on Saturday mornings so sleeping residents aren’t woken by the sound of smashing bottles.
The pub closed in December 2004 – less than 12 months after Hookes’ death – after patronage fell amid public outcry over the incident, which led to manslaughter charges for the bouncer and a not-guilty verdict in the Supreme Court.
In the lead-up to the pub’s closure, staff were threatened and bricks thrown through windows as anger spilt over in an outpouring of grief for the ex-Test player and Victorian cricket coach. A former manager was quoted at the time saying they had received death threats.
Since then, the grey building has been partially boarded up on Melbourne’s bayside waterfront. Plans to build 15 apartments on the site in the mid-2000s were abandoned, but part of the building has been used as a home.
The pub is owned by Geoffrey Ogden, whose family runs several venues in Western Australia.
Hotelier Ella Ogden told the council chamber her family was “passionate about preserving and celebrating heritage buildings, and this project reflects our deep commitment to the local area and its cultural identity” – but Ogden declined to comment further when contacted by The Age.
With Tom Cowie
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clarification
A previous version of this story referenced comments by a councillor which spoke of the venue operating solely as a bar with no food service. The council has since clarified the venue will be allowed to serve food. The story has been amended to reflect this.