By the Friends of Gasworks Arts Park

At the Council meeting on the 6th July, Council voted to request the Victorian Schools Building Authority (VSBA) to brief Council on the development of the Victorian Youth Arts Precinct (VYAP) on the former Multinet depot site next to Gasworks Park.

Despite numerous requests, it has been very difficult to get information from the Council, the local member Martin Foley or the VSBA.  Residents remain ill-informed and it seems there will only be consultation when everything for the VYAP is in place. The VSBA does not need any planning permits and construction is scheduled to commence later this year.

To maintain the Park’s amenity we are asking Council to protect the brick wall between the Park and this new development.  We have been told the wall is jointly owned. The plans on the web site “Victorian Youth Arts Precinct” don’t show the wall. 

This development is not only a large arts facility, but a campus shared by two schools with over 2000 students. If the complex is open to the Park there will be no way to control the use and flow of students (and visitors/audiences) all over the Park. In other words, it will be a school ground with a consequential detrimental effect on the enjoyment of the Park by other users. If Council is not going to stop the wall being demolished then a new fence should be built to define the Park land from the school campus and to control unlimited access.

Cr Louise Crawford at the Council meeting said the VYAP development had nothing to do with the Council and if residents had any questions, they should contact VSBA. This is not good enough. 

Council does have a responsibility to look after local resident's interests. This development is on a commercial scale. The proposed fifty performances a year will generate considerable traffic and require a lot of staff. This development will create parking and traffic problems as well as impacting detrimentally on our local open space.

A theatre for the school is acceptable, but this large development is being squeezed into a small site and is in the wrong place. It should be in the Arts Precinct near the College of the Arts High School not in a residential area which should be catering for local high school students.

Please ask your Councilors to save the brick wall and address the parking and traffic problems this inappropriate development will create.

Email or ring your Councilors and CEO, click here. 

And sign our petition on change.org, click here.