Hobsons Bay council has released its position statement on a 10-storey, 600-home development proposed for the former Caltex site in South Kingsville.
As reported by Star Weekly in January, residents are fighting the development proposed by Tract Consultants for land at 38-48 Blackshaws Road and 24 Sutton Street.
Tract has appealed to the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (VCAT) after the council failed to make a decision within the prescribed period because of insufficient information.
The council position is that the development’s height should be reduced to a maximum of six storeys and the number of dwellings scaled back to 420.
A Facebook page called No to High Density in Newport, claims the current proposal would bring at least 2000 more people and 1200 more vehicles to Williamstown Road, The Avenue and Millers Road, “which are already congested”. In January, the page administrator, Chris Turner, told Star Weekly residents were glad the 4.5-hectare site was being converted from industrial to residential but were against high rise, overdevelopment.
Cr Peter Hemphill said the main issues for the council and community were height, density and traffic. He said increased development in the area was placing strain on the two main arterials out of the area, Melbourne and Millers roads.
“Developers don’t seem to have any appreciation of the issues,” he said. “They just want to build houses, make money, scoot off and leave us with the problems.”
Cr Angela Altair said the council’s position statement would help it at the appeal stage.
“We would like to think that after very extensive work by our officers and consultants, we’ve come to a position that we feel can be well argued and defended at VCAT,” she said.
