Moonee Valley High RiseBy Corinne Kilpatrick 8D

What is the high rise?

Over 2000 apartments will be built making the project cost at least $1.4 BILLION. There will be four towers and all of them will be more than 24 story's high. These towers have been drafted to be built in the existing car park, and other various areas. This track holds the Cox plate every year. Because of these towers being built, the actual race coarse is being moved into the centre, as part of the track has to be ripped up to make room for the apartments. Because of the Moonee Valleys push to get these apartments, other race courses such as Caulfield and Flemington are keen to do the exact thing.

What are the negative affects this plan will have?

The existing grandstand will be taken down to provide room for the apartments and will be rebuilt looking at the school across the road, where alcoholics and people gambling could potentially be witnessed by students if they looked or could hear people making loud noises (people getting into fights, swearing etc.). There would be a loading zone placed next too a primary school where many trucks will be entering, increasing risks that young children and family's could be hit by a truck resulting in serious injury's or death. More people will be using public transport system, where the community is already struggling trying to fit everyone in at the moment, if thousands of people were to buy one of these apartments and use public transport you would be lucky to ever get on!

More negative impacts…

Views from surrounding houses of the high rise buildings will be blocked, the volume of noise will be increased due to the noise coming from the balconies. The traffic will be increased significantly and finding parks will be a nightmare, the amount of cars illegally parked would rise if this project was to go ahead. There would be more cars on the freeway, and on residential streets. There is an estimated rise of 11000 car journeys a day on roads if these towers were built, which will make traffic a nightmare.

What will be gained from the high rise

The people which are funding for the four towers to be built are people who own the racecourse, if it is built they will become super rich once people start to purchase the apartments. Local stores ( on the main street which is Puckle Street) will have more customers therefore make more money.

What is going to happen?

All the existing car park and particular parts of the track are going to be demolished to make room for the four buildings which are going to be built. This includes the grandstand (which contains a gambling room and a restaurant) which will be rebuilt facing a local primary school. The track will be moved back closer to the freeway to make room for the towers. A loading zone will be placed next to a primary school, so that trucks can deliver food, or take trash etc. All together this massive project is expected to take at least 10-15 years, if there are no delays during the process, so the amount of years could be expanded.

What it is planned to look like…

What do the locals think?

The locals aren't happy about this, because their not going to gain anything from this, and there the ones that are going to suffer due to all the traffic issues that will arise if these buildings are approved.

What action is being taken?

Many locals have signed various petitions to try and stop and stop the high rise, apparently there was over one thousand signatures. Also many people have been turning up to regular meetings to discuss what action they are taking next and what they have already achieved. They also talk about trying to raise awareness about the issue. People all around the community are buying signs and placing it at the front of their house to show that they don’t want these buildings to be built and so other people find out about the issue if they didn’t already know.

The signs people are buying

Thank you