HOW IT ALL UNFOLDED
More than 60 architects, designers, planners and Geelong leaders take part in the Vision 2 planning process to reshape the future of Geelong’s city centre. Project leader Professor Hisham Elkadi coins the phrase “green spine” to describe the linear park he imagines running through the CBD from the train station.
Newly minted mayor Darryn Lyons adopts the vision, promising to build a “city in a park” and turn the Malop/Moorabool St intersection into “Geelong’s Central Park”.
Lyons’s first budget allocates $7 million to CBD “revitalisation”. September: Premier Denis Napthine adds $3 million of state money to kickstart Vision 2, starting with works on Malop and Little Malop streets.
CoGG lays fake grass, planter boxes and garden furniture in Malop St — between Moorabool and Yarra streets. The Malop Street Lab is billed as a trial site for the mayor’s “city in a park” vision.
The street lab is ripped up only y weeks after the council is sacked. But the councillors have already committed to the Green Spine. Days after the temporary features go, CoGG releases concept drawings and details of the plan. They foreshadow a $17.5 million, 450m man-made Malop St forest from Johnstone Park to Yarra St. It’s envisioned pedestrians and cyclists will take precedence as cars are slowed and encouraged to other routes. Further plans show the “botanic walk” will eventually stretch to Eastern Park.
Works on the Green Spine between Yarra and Moorabool streets starts. The street is shutdown for more than a year, and traders report significant disruption. Some claim the works sent them to the wall, others launch legal action against CoGG for compensation.
There is fanfare, including a football-kicking contest, to mark the officially opening of the first section of the Green Spine in August. The works cost $8 million.
Less than 10 months after the road was opened, Cr Eddy