CONSTRUCTION of the $14 million Arthurs Seat chairlift could start as early as next spring and be completed before the end of 2015, says project chief Simon McKeon. Mr McKeon, head of Arthurs Seat Skylift, said it was hoped to submit a “package of reports” to Mornington Peninsula Shire and Parks Victoria before the end of the year. “If all goes well, we’re hoping to get approval by the end of the first quarter of 2014,” he told The News. “We’ll run a tender process with major chairlift makers such as Poma and Doppelmayr, and hope to start assembly and…
Browsing: Arthurs Seat
THE controversial Dromana quarry tip plan is dead. Quarry owners R E Ross Trust will officially announce on Tuesday it will not appeal the Environment Protection Authority’s refusal to grant a permit, which was handed down last month. The decision brings to an end one of the most controversial and hated proposals on the southern peninsula for many years. A government source told The News that Ross Trust chairman Ian Vaughan would announce the decision on Tuesday night at a meeting of Peninsula Waste Management’s community reference group. Ross Trust owns PWM as well as Hillview Quarries in Dromana. The…
THE Environment Protection Authority has knocked back an application for a rubbish tip, or landfill, in the old Pioneer quarry on the Arthurs Seat escarpment at Dromana. It was announced on Friday morning with the EPA saying the proposal did not comply with “threshold issues around groundwater, construction design and management”. The decision is a blow to tip proponent Peninsula Waste Management and its owner R E Ross Trust as well as Mornington Peninsula Region Waste Management Group of which Mornington Peninsula Shire is the sole member. The waste group had earmarked the quarry as a potential tip site in…
AN overzealous ranger who removed “anti-tip” signs from roadsides in Arthurs Seat, Red Hill and Dromana last Saturday has forced Mornington Peninsula Shire to issue a public apology. The shire posted a statement on its website on Sunday after receiving complaints from Peninsula Preservation Group members and other anti-tip sign owners. Shire officers delivered the signs to a PPG member’s home on Sunday. The statement said rangers would return a number of “no tip” protest signs “that were mistakenly impounded on Saturday”. Claire Smith, the shire’s manager of environment protection and community safety, said signs had been removed from “the…
SIGNS of the times are popping up around the southern peninsula as the anti-tip campaign gains momentum. Peninsula Preservation Group – the lead objector to the plan to put a rubbish tip, or landfill, in the old Pioneer quarry at Dromana – has distributed more than 300 anti-tip signs to members and supporters as well as bumper stickers. The signs have been appearing on freeway bridges, in people’s front yards and on fences, beside roads and, cheekily, next to Hillview Quarries’ entrance on Boundary Rd in Dromana (pictured). Hillview Quarries and tip proponent Peninsula Waste Management are owned by the…
OPPOSITION to the proposed rubbish tip in an old quarry on Arthurs Seat is mounting with more than 500 people packing Dromana Hall last Saturday for the first meeting of Peninsula Preservation Group. It was arguably the largest protest meeting on the southern peninsula since the anti-dredging rally on Rosebud foreshore in February 2008. People who could not get into the hall stood outside, watching and listening through open windows. Tip proponent Peninsula Waste Management, owned by R E Ross Trust, has asked the Environment Protection Authority to approve its plan. It also needs the OK from Mornington Peninsula Shire.…
THE Arthurs Seat chairlift was removed on Wednesday last week and now lies in a Dromana storage yard awaiting transport to Adelaide. Its removal brings to an end a long and sometimes bitter battle between Richard Hudson, who has owned the chairlift for more than 30 years, and the state government’s WorkSafe Authority and Parks Victoria. The chairlift troubles started on 3 January 2003 when one of eight pylons collapsed, sending about a dozen people to hospital and stranding many of the 50 people aboard, some for up to six hours. A WorkSafe investigation found the collapse was caused by…
AN old quarry on the eastern side of Arthurs Seat could become the Mornington Peninsula’s newest rubbish tip. Hillview Quarries, owned by R E Ross Trust, is expected to submit an application to the shire council in about four weeks. The landfill plan would see the former Pioneer Quarry, which is east of Arthurs Seat State Park and north of Arthurs Seat Rd, used to dump household waste – 75 per cent from the shire and 25 per cent from outside. Up to 100 trucks a day would enter the bush precinct off Boundary Rd in Dromana. The proposal has…
MORNINGTON Peninsula’s oldest house is in danger of closing unless more volunteers are found to help run the historical property. The National Trust has appealed for assistance to keep McCrae Homestead open to the public. McCrae Homestead manager Sharon Bowen said peninsula residents could “keep alive our pioneer heritage”. “There is an urgent need for more people to assist in guiding visitors, housekeeping and maintenance of the house, visitor centre and gardens,” she said. Volunteers are asked to give two half-days each month. Built in 1844 on Arthur’s Seat Run, the largest lease in the fledgling Port Phillip colony, the…
ARTHURS Seat’s historic lookout tower is no more. The 78-year-old concrete and steel tower was demolished last Wednesday by Parks Victoria’s contractors Guilfoyle Australasia. The company used a high-reach excavator that reminded onlookers of a mechanical Tyrannosaurus rex. It chewed through the tower in a matter of hours. On Monday and Tuesday, the contractors salvaged a number of items from the tower, which Dromana and District Historical Society president Peter Holloway hopes will be displayed in an interpretative centre. The centre would either be a small building on the footprint of the tower or part of the top station of…