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News Bulletins

Our latest News Bulletin on issues and events in the park is here.

Royal Park Master Plan Update

The draft RP Master Plan was presented for approval to proceed at the FMC 10 September 2024.  Below is the submission made at the meeting:

 Submission re: Report to the Future Melbourne Committee, 10 September 2024 Agenda item 6.1: Draft Royal Park Master Plan 

We start by reiterating some excerpts from the Heritage Review (2014) document:

  • Royal Park is rare, as the most outstanding and intact example of the metropolitan parks set aside from the 1840s for the people of Victoria;
  • ….. the 1984 Master Plan is significant for its design philosophy and natural landscape aesthetic. In 2010, the Australian Institute of Landscape Architects awarded the City of Melbourne the “ALIA national award …. for “its stewardship of Royal Park as a nationally significant landscape”.

I fear the current draft RP Master Plan has lost sight of these points.

The current plan speaks to:

  • Satisfying the ever growing need for active sports areas (increasing number and usage of existing). (Sports fields already account for 40% of the park area);
  • Provide for through traffic – larger footpaths and more of them;
  • Increased lighting – of sports fields and pathways.

We are the guardians of the Park for future generations and we cannot let short term pressures and solutions overtake long term planning and the preservation of critical “infrastructure”.

Some examples (and our comments) from the draft that are considered excessive are as follows:

  1. Dissecting the ”grass circle” with 2 extra pathways to allow more direct walking between points.
    1. Surely this is not a good reason to destroy the integrity of this area? Part of the beauty of the “natural landscape” is a lack of straight lines!
  2. Pathway lighting:
    1. Lighting of pathway from tramstop to nature play area and Gatehouse St. The safest way for people to exit the 55 tram after dark and walk to the Parkville South Precinct or playground is surely to proceed to Flemington Rd and walk up the lit footpath rather than further intrusion of lights in the park?
    2. Lighting along tramline (existing) should be reviewed with an eye to being removed ….adjacent pathway can be lit by sensor lighting if needed.
    3. Road lighting to SNHC and Urban Camp should be eliminated (it just means speeds to be reduced) rather than upgraded. Lighting at facilities is only required.  (No-one walks up these roads to the facilities!)
    4. Why introduce an unlit path from the Avenue to the Golf Club when access along the Avenue is already available?
    5. Why introduce a new lighted path from Park St to the Golf Club? Is this a safety issue for golfers?
  3. Expanding North Park Tennis club
    1. What about finding a new home for a larger Club nearby? – as part of the new Arden estate?
  4. Use of Walmsley House and Lodge as a café and visitor centre?
    1. Is this really a proposal worth considering? Will visitors starting at that corner of the park be enough to warrant such a venue?  Can some form of visitor centre be incorporated at or within existing infrastructure spots such as the hospital/zoo/golf course?
    2. Where does the nursery and facilities for park maintenance then go? (Albert Park depot was turned into a school and a new building built for this purpose being more loss of parkland)

Melbourne is going to keep growing so trying to cope with sporting needs in the Park alone is doomed to fail – we need to create new sporting facilities away from the Park and near new centres of population growth such as the Arden precinct.  As pressure to develop continues we will be facing these same questions in another 50 years so looking for more space not using up the bits we have left is vitally important.

 If we are to really be the guardians of the Park and to carry forward the vision of Latrobe and those that followed then we cannot allow short term solutions to dominate our thinking.  Latrobe in setting up this Park certainly had a long term vision – surely we can do the same?

Cr Rohan Leppart moved a motion to amend the approval of this draft which was passed.

Those that care about the future of the park now need to be on alert for the next iteration which will be under the auspices of a new Council (elections in October!)……watch this space.

Bird Watching anyone?

One of our keen bird watching members has set up an iNaturalist  “Project” called Royal Park, Parkville which collates all the entries already logged in iNaturalist and any future entries that occur within the perimeters shown on the map (see link). 

Check it out… https://inaturalist.ala.org.au/projects/royal-park-parkville. If you click on “view all” next to Recent Observations, you can scroll through all the photos people have uploaded. The ones listed as “research grade” have been verified as the correct identification.

There are some “learning the system” links which are :  Getting Started · iNaturalist   and  Video Tutorials · iNaturalist  which differ depending on whether you use phone or PC.   However there are many more functions available using a browser via the Web rather than the App.    

We hope that we can get more people to add entries over time, especially moths & bats.

Building a database of the birds, bats, insects and animals in the Park will enhance our ability to protect the Park from future threats.