By Carole Levy
No matter what the address in Altona, it’s never more than a six-minute drive to either the swimming beach, the iconic pier or the wonderful Cherry Lake. Mostly it’s less. This is a significant – though not the sole – reason for the rising numbers of families and singles moving in to Altona.
Yes, there’s sea and lake and multiple reserves and a stunning pier as playgrounds for Altonians, but if you ask the locals you’ll hear just as often about the way you regularly run into friends and neighbours shopping, propped behind an alfresco coffee or picking up fish ‘n’ chips on Esplanade for Friday dinner.
While Altona has long been a literal hive of industry, it nevertheless has a seaside community soul, a strong identity underscored further following the influx of European migrants post WW11, bringing people who forged and relied on community links that continue to resonate today. Altona is a village, in a city, in a coastal locale, in Melbourne’s evolving west: the quadrella.
