Jenny Warfe delivered this submission and spoke to it verbally at Planning Panels Victoria, Frankston hearing on C160fran Ammendment. The Amendment would mandate population growth-engineering and a mega city in Frankston, at the head of the Mornington Peninsula, on Port Phillip Bay. Port Phillip Conservation Council (PPCC) Inc. represents 13 conservation groups around Port Phillip Bay and their hundreds of individual members.  For over 50 years their major focus has been the preservation and rehabilitation of Port Phillip, its unique coastal areas and hinterland.

 

Excerpts from the submission. 

Footnotes have been removed.  Find the entire referenced document by clicking here:

From paragraphs 13-30: 

13.  Lower heights and mandatory controls are essential to protect not just the Frankston coastal environs from view stealing high rise developments proposed for Precinct 4; but also to maintain the coastal landscape around the entire east side of Port Phillip Bay.

14.  From Portsea to St. Kilda, Councils have low-rise building controls in their coastal precincts, and very few areas where private dwellings even exist seaward of Nepean Hwy - or their coastal roads closest to the foreshore.

15.  Inexplicably, Frankston’s coastline is the outlier, with high-rise private developments planned (and championed) so close to the coastline, and seaward of Nepean Hwy., setting an ugly precedent for the rest of Port Phillip Bay’s coastline coming under challenge for waterfront high rise.

16.  The term “preferred’ is ill defined and unhelpful. Preferred by whom? It signals decision makers will likely approve variations to preferred heights, creating opportunities for taller and taller and more dominating structures near the coast, and ever more developer demands. We suggest “preferred” be removed from at least Precinct 4 of the Structure Plan, and that mandatory height restrictions be included to protect the irreplaceable coastal environmental assets and ambience that - of all the MACs - only Frankston has.   

17.  Otherwise, high rise towers between Kananook Creek and Nepean Highway would begin to transform Frankston’s waterfront area - culminating in a wall of masonry from Wells St. to Beach St. and perhaps further south? separating Frankston’s prime waterfront from its city centre.

18.  This threat is already evident in applications for side-by- side apartment towers of 14 and 16 storeys in Frankston’s Promenade (Waterfront) precinct recently before VCAT.

19. The Planning Scheme Amendment is an opportunity to signal the need for tighter controls to protect the irreplaceable, unique features Frankston's coastal location provides to the community and the broader environment - before it is forever diminished and degraded by a permissive Planning Scheme.

20.  For Frankston’s coastline and Kananook Creek, the PS Amendment fails that essential task.  And- once that area and the unique features it offers the public realm have been hijacked for private gain, the opportunity to protect this irreplaceable public asset for its beauty and equitable enjoyment will never again be available. 

 

 

Marine & Coastal Act and Policy

 

Slide 3 M&C environment

21. ‘Definition of ‘Marine and Coastal environment’

 

 

 

22. ‘Marine and Coastal environment’ has a specific meaning in the Marine & Coastal Act 2018 

Marine and Coastal Act Section 5:

(1) Subject to this section, marine and coastal environment means the following between the outer limit of Victorian coastal waters and 5 kilometres inland of the high-water mark of the sea—

(a) the land (whether or not covered by water) to a depth of 200 metres below the surface of that land;

(b) any water covering the land referred to in paragraph (a) from time to time;

(c) the biodiversity associated with the land and water referred to in paragraphs (a) and (b).

 

23. Unarguably, Precinct 4 is located within the ‘Marine and Coastal environment’ as per the Marine & Coastal Act 2018 and M&C Policy 2020 definitions

 

24. It is also quite clear that the entire ACZ1 Precinct 4, seaward of Nepean Highway is part of the Marine and Coastal environment and thus subject to special protections under the Act.

 

25. Therefore, we submit that all of the ACZ1 west of Nepean Highway and adjacent to Kananook Creek should not be part of an ‘Activity Centre’. That entire area is at most 250 metres from the Port Phillip Bay shoreline and foreshore at its Nepean Hwy. boundary. 

Substantial sections are much less than 200 metres from Nepean Highway to the shoreline.

26. As such, developments currently proposed for Precinct 4 in the proposed Schedule 1 to the new Activity Centre Zone for the FMAC, or any future similar proposals, do not or would not meet the clear intent of the M&C Act 2018, M&C Policy 2020, or The Victorian Coastal Strategy 2022, Siting and Design Guidelines for Structures on the Victorian Coast (2020) and reference document Landscape Setting Types for the Victorian Coast (May 1998). 

 

 Slide 4 Proposed development sites Precinct 4

 

Picture: Approx. 195 metres from centre of the proposed development at 438 - 444 Nepean Hwy to landward edge of the beach (Google Maps 23 June 2023).

 

27. Some of the current proposals in Precinct 4, at their seaward boundary, are significantly less than 200 metres from Port Phillip Bay’s high-water mark, and only approx. 20 metres from Kananook Creek – a waterway with its entire length at sea level. So, as sea levels rise, so too will the water level in Kananook Creek. By applying the rule of thumb Bruun Rule, it is possible that creek water could encroach 50 – 100 metres into sites adjoining Kananook Creek - depending on tide level, storm surge and wind direction, or confluence of events. 

 

28. In our view, Precinct 4 should instead be completely re-imagined as an area designed for climate change resilience, eschewing any further housing or commercial developments and instead employing natural and soft engineering responses to create a resilient “coastal buffer parkland” able to withstand future impacts of increasingly challenging coastal conditions. This would create more open space for recreational coastal activities and superior protection for Frankston’s coastline whilst also protecting important coastal assets.

Climate Change and the coastal environment

29. We submit the directions set for Precinct 4 give little to no regard to the compelling body of evidence that, to deal with looming global heating impacts, future coastal development must depart radically from the Business-as-Usual (BAU) model which seem to dominate FCC’s current “vision” for its coastline.

 

30. Further, the proposed directions for Precinct 4 do not meet various legislation and policies regarding the Marine and Coastal environment and broader environment and climate change policies. Therefore, the proposed high-rise, high-density developments envisaged for this area are utterly unsuitable for Precinct 4 and Frankston’s future as a climate change resilient coastal city.

How long can we continue to ignore the very different future we face, especially in our coastal zones?

How long have we already been in denial?