We need action…

Thank you to everyone who came along to our first Montague Community Forum.

It was heartening to see a big turnout with such dynamic discussion.

As one of the residents said: “It is a great opportunity to engage directly with policy makers and our elected representatives in matters that affect us day to day.”

We were grateful that Minister Martin Foley, Mayor Bernadene Voss, Ministerial Advisory Council chair Meredith Sussex, principal of South Melbourne Primary Noel Creece and David Teague from VicRoads joined the panel.

And we also thank the Golden Fleece Hotel for the room and of course Southbank Local News for partnering the Montague Community Alliance in putting on the first of these forums.

So … you would have noticed that our Montague Bridge has been hit twice in this week alone, which yet again brought traffic to a standstill.

This meant all the smaller streets were jam-packed, so lucky we talked about traffic management in Montague eh?

It seems that there was general acknowledgement by all the panelist that there are real problems with the current situation in Montague.

And until the final Framework Plan for Fishermans Bend is confirmed and published later this year, there was a consensus that we needed to focus on the current situation and challenges in which we find ourselves.

What this means we have still to see. I hope co-ordinated action will be taken very soon.

To reiterate, the issues we discussed were: The impact on available parking for current residents and businesses with the huge influx of tradespeople and contractors working on building sites; The exponential increase of workers as Montague attracts more and more small and creative businesses and visitors to those businesses; Businesses attracting customers that are driving to meetings and require parking; Additional traffic adding to the significant congestion in the small streets, such as Gladstone St and Boundary St. That includes large trucks and other vehicles needing to access the building sites; and The huge and ever-increasing traffic that flows along the arterials of City Rd, Montague St and Normanby Rd – all of which either intersect or surround the Montague Precinct. We have heard nothing yet from our panelists, but the good news is that we have brought these overlooked issues into focus with stakeholders who can influence outcomes.

There was a clear understanding that attention needed to be paid NOW on how residents, businesses and communities both in, and on the interface with, the precinct are being currently affected.

We again remind the influencers that this precinct is a busy 24/7 area.

It is vibrant, dynamic and full of people and traffic.

And even though the Minister for Planning’s new Framework Plan may assist with some of our challenges in the future, we need this help now.

Development is here to stay, 40-storey buildings are in the pipeline sooner that we think, literally on our doorstep.

Port Melbourne and South Melbourne residential zones abut these developments.

For all our health, safety and amenity let’s get some transitional plans in place.

The community is waiting. We need action now …   Trisha Avery Convener - Montague Community Alliance