PLANNING PAINS: St Leonards calls for refreshed town centre design

ST LEONARDS residents are urging the City of Greater Geelong to accelerate a planning process aimed at safeguarding the town from its increasing population and ensuring its reputation as a holiday destination.

St Leonards Community Committee, a sub-group of the St Leonards Progress Association, is calling on the city to deliver an Urban Design Framework (UDF) for the town to ensure sustainable development for its growing population.

New housing estates and development such as a commercial and residential development at the site of a former carpark at 1-2 Bluff Road are compounding their concerns.

UDFs are suburb-specific frameworks that outline the desired future planning outcomes for communities.

St Leonards residents say the northern Bellarine town’s changing demographics require a refresh of its outdated plans.

Community Committee member Kevin Carey has led ongoing efforts to continue the project, which he said was vital to ensure the ongoing viability of businesses and attraction of coastal hotspots.

“There’s virtually only one car park, which is a council-controlled park behind the supermarket and the other big one is on the foreshore, which is Bellarine Bayside,” he said.

“The issue we’ve got is that that that because there’s no parking, people just park anywhere and everywhere.”

The city’s St Leonards Structure Plan in 2015 used figures from the 2011 Census and estimated its permanent population at the time was 2,090 and would reach 2,394 by 2021.

But subsequent data has shown the town has far outstripped those predictions, with the town reaching 3,542 residents by the 2021 Census.

The rise was partly due to increased housing development resulting in an extra 900 homes built during the 10-year period – about 300 more than the city had expected.

The number of unoccupied houses was largely stagnant, but decreased as a proportion between the counts, down from 59 per cent to 45 per cent.

Mr Carey submitted to the city’s 2023/24 budget hearing process last month, where he argued an updated UDF was a relatively small investment the city could make to greatly improve the town’s future prospects.

Local businesses including St Leonards Blue Seas Burgers and Pizza, and St Leonards IGA also wrote to councillors about the UDF and related parking issues, with St Leonards Probus also among the seven submitters on the topics.

But the UDF project is still without funding in the city’s four-year plan, with supporters unclear when or if it can continue.

“We were supposed to get it in the 2023/24 budget, but it’s been advanced to the 2024/25 budget,” Mr Carey said.

“But that doesn’t necessarily say we’re going to get it, because it’s just a consideration for the 2024/25.”

The city’s well publicised budget constraints created a backlog of planning and infrastructure projects that likely have inside running against plans yet to appear in its budget estimates – including $1.35 million for upgrades at St Leonards Cricket Club.