Progress needs all parties in place
AS the late Bill Hunter famously espoused in the 1994 film Muriel’s Wedding, you can’t stop progress.
While Geelong is far removed from the fictional town of Porpoise Spit, Bill Heslop’s catchphrase is one that could well describe how rapidly our region is expanding.
Population influx from the relocation of major government agencies and people priced out of Melbourne’s skyrocketing property market, as well as a steady stream of seachangers, has seen our part of the world grow and evolve at breakneck speed.
The next phase of that evolution looks to be coming from out west with the City of Greater Geelong revealing its plan to house 110,000 new residents by the year 2050.
This time the growth is mainly slated for areas away from the coast, with plans for 22,000 new homes at Batesford and another 17,000 properties at Lovely Banks.
They will add to further development at Armstrong Creek (another 22,000 homes), the Bellarine Peninsula (12,700 new homes) and Lara West (6000).
The council development plan also references 10 town centres; 200ha for new businesses; two major transport corridors for buses, walking and cyclists; and schools and community facilities.
It is all very exciting. New development means new jobs, new residents and plenty of business to keep the local economy ticking over.
But the excitement can be tempered very quickly if the supporting infrastructure does not match the speed at which homes are built and suburbs developed. Just ask the residents of Armstrong Creek, who waited years for their first supermarket, or the parents at Leopold who are today calling out for a secondary school.
And 110,000 more people potentially means even more cars on our roads and parking in our city centre, so Geelong’s public transport needs to be boosted accordingly.
Geelong is growing at a faster rate than the rest of the state and the plan to accommodate that demand is both necessary and exciting.
But we all need to be on the same page to make sure nobody gets left behind.