By Mikayla van Loon
A show of community objection has brought about a refusal of a proposed service station next door to a primary school in Mount Evelyn.
The issue saw much discussion at the Yarra Ranges Council meeting on Tuesday 14 March, where Councillor Tim Heenan moved an alternate motion to refuse the service station development at 41 Monbulk Road.
Concerns for Peregrine Corporation’s proposed petrol station, car wash and convenience store sited for the former Mt Evelyn Garden and Produce land included the proximity to a school, traffic issues and exposed fumes.
Lead petitioner and resident of Monbulk Road Nic Sanders spoke on behalf of the 194 objectors, bringing to light an independent traffic report and community survey.
When Star Mail spoke to Mr Sanders last month, he couldn’t fathom the location of the petrol station given the closeness to Mount Evelyn Primary School, something that was echoed in his presentation to the council.
“The site is directly next door to Mount Evelyn Primary School. This is an unacceptable health risk given published studies show a causal link between continuous environmental exposure to petrol fumes in children and childhood leukaemia,” he said.
“Our local primary school should be a safe place, not the future site of a cancer cluster.”
Peregrine Corporation general manager planning Andrew Caspar said fuel vapour recovery systems would be used to combat vapour escaping when underground tanks were being filled.
“The EPA has legislated guidelines and requirements that must and will be complied with to ensure appropriate air quality outcomes and ensure there are no health risks,” he said.
“The proposal will not produce any health risks and there is no reason for refusal on these grounds.”
Commissioning an independent traffic report through SALT traffic engineers, Mr Sanders said many of the proposed traffic arrangements did not meet Australian safety standard AS2890.1.
This included the proposed access point being opposite Aqueduct Avenue, inappropriate designed turning lanes and inadequate queueing and turning space within the site.
“The traffic report makes no mention of this requirement and falsely claims relevant Australian standards requirements are met,” Mr Sanders said.
SALT associate director and traffic engineer of 17 years Jarrod Wicks confirmed his concerns outlined in his report.
“This site in particular doesn’t seem well suited to a service station given the compromised access arrangements,” he said.
“I note the traffic report seemed to say we’re going to provide some turn lanes because that’s what the Department of Transport and Planning has requested.
“I don’t think there’s been a lot of thought into the actual designs of those turn lanes and the safety impacts it will create versus existing conditions to adjacent properties.”
Traffix Group founding manager and report writer on behalf of Peregrine Corporation, Henry Turnbull said he believed the turning lane design was a better alternative to what was there now.
“In terms of the access point, it is true the Australian standard does say that where possible you should try not to have access immediately opposite an intersection…but this is a site that has existing access, 39 and 41 both have access immediately opposite Aqueduct Avenue,” he said.
“The right turn access to 39 was raised as being a problem…if you look at the situation now, a right turning vehicle into number 39 in fact blocks all through vehicles and that’s not a desirable situation.
“My view is it is a much safer arrangement to have turning lanes and that’s endorsed by the Department of Transport and Planning.”
Given Monbulk Road is an arterial access road, the Department of Transport and Planning is the authoritative body.
Mr Wicks, however, raised that a Road Safety Audit hadn’t been conducted but rather worked into the conditions of approving a permit which seemed counterproductive.
“This is a site that lends itself to having a safety audit undertaken right at the start rather than after a permit has been issued.”
Mr Sanders called on the councillors to refuse the approval of this service station based on health risks and traffic management flaws.
“We want you, our elected representatives, to refuse this application based on the traffic issues raised.
“We want you to refuse this application because of the unacceptable health risks to school children from petrol vapour and fumes based on published studies.”
Cr Heenan put forward the motion to refuse the application, seconded by Cr Len Cox, and said given his nearly 40 years in Mount Evelyn and understanding of the community, he didn’t believe the service station was necessary.
Based on the increased traffic flow through the area, particularly in school hours, Cr Heenan said he could not support the development.
“This in the last few decades has increased substantially, absolutely substantially and in particular Clegg Road and Monbulk Road,” he said.
“We’ve had many, many incidents of concern with traffic movement there, particularly during school hours, in the morning and in the afternoon, and that’s what concerns me about this development.”
These traffic issues, Cr Heenan said, not only affect Monbulk Road but Clegg Road and Birmingham Road outside two more primary schools.
“We don’t need another infrastructure like this in that area. I want to go on to say that I know my community. I understand how Mount Evelyn [people] feel. I’ve been listening for years to concerns on these sorts of developments.
“Mount Evelyn is not a suburb. It’s a township with a large rural feel.”
Supporting Cr Heenan in his decision, Cr Cox said given the items raised and the number of objections, this was more than a planning matter.
“This is classed as a planning manner but it’s much more than just a planning manner. It’s a people matter and you can justify all sorts of planning without taking into account the issues that people have,” he said.
“We’ve heard the applicants say no gas can get out when petrol is delivered. Well, every minute of the day while people are buying petrol gas is coming out into the atmosphere.
“All these young kids at the school don’t need to be breathing petrol fumes or exhaust fumes at all. Unfortunately, we can’t avoid the exhaust fumes from time to time, but we can avoid adding to the petrol fumes.”
Councillors Fiona McAllister and Sophie Todorov both said based on the new evidence submitted by the objectors they had reservations about the application and couldn’t support the approval.
The decision to refuse the planning application was unanimously passed by all councillors.
Mr Sanders said it was a “great feeling” to have been able to convey the concerns of Mount Evelyn residents and convince the council to refuse the development.
“Even though the council discussed the vapour objection as well, I think it was the very factual and visual traffic report that really put doubts in their minds and they voted on those doubts,” he said.
Moving forward Mr Sanders said the community would prepare to fight this even more as it will most certainly go to VCAT.
“The community are ecstatic that it was rejected and we won the fight but we now need to start preparing for a VCAT hearing as the applicant will go down this line and we will need to fight it again,” he said.
“The community does not want this servo at this location next to our primary school on Monbulk Road.”
In the long term, Mr Sanders said the community would like to see the council advocate for planning changes to be made at a State government level to ensure petrol stations cannot be built within a certain distance of a primary school.
“We want someone to call on the Planning Minister of Victoria to not allow any future service stations to be built within 50 metres of any early child centre or any primary school in Victoria. This is what is really important for the health and safety of our children.”
