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Waurn Ponds Stabling and Maintenance Facility Planning Scheme Amendment GC 104

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Waurn Ponds Stabling and Maintenance Facility Planning Scheme Amendment GC 104 Waurn Ponds Stabling and Maintenance Facility Planning Scheme Amendment GC 104 Date: 03/02/20 Author: Mike Stephens Version: Final Recipient/s: Ashurst Australia Waurn Ponds Stabling and Maintenance Facility Planning Scheme Amendment GC 104 Expert Witness Report Mike Stephens Yendon a 96 Harbours Road, Yendon VIC 3352 I p 03 5341 6100 I f 03 5341 7630 I e [email protected] Casterton a PO Box 226, 32 Henty Street, Casterton, VIC 3311 I p 03 5581 2826 I f 03 5581 2746 I e [email protected] abn 63 093 095 875 I acn 093 095 875 I www.meridian-ag.com.au 1. Expert qualifications and experience - Michael (Mike) Richard Stephens Mike holds a Diploma of Farm Management, and an MSc. He is an accredited advisor with Family Business Australia, is a Chartered Agricultural Professional (CAG) with the Ag Institute of Australia and is currently a PhD candidate studying Family Farm Business Succession. He is a Churchill Fellow (Farm Business Management), was awarded the inaugural Marcus Oldham College Excellence in Agriculture Award and is a Fellow of The Ag Institute Australia and the Australian Institute of Company Directors. Following experience as a Jackaroo, Stockman with New Zealand Loan, (Stock and Station Agency) and as a Snowy Mountains Scheme Worker, Mike graduated from Marcus Oldham and commenced working as a Property Manager in 1967. During his career as a property manager Mike managed properties running merino sheep and stud and commercial beef cattle. From 1983 to the present day Mike has been a Director of Meridian Agriculture (formerly Mike Stephens and Associates - MS&A), which is a broad based agricultural consulting company, providing advice, training and services to farmers, agribusiness and government. The company and its affiliates have a team of twelve consultants plus support staff. From 1983 until 1994 as part of the services offered Mike acted as farm manager for two properties. The major enterprise in both properties managed was wool production from a self-replacing merino flock. One was intersected by the four lane Calder Highway and the Melbourne Bendigo railway. Mike is familiar with the issues related to moving sheep and machinery across such infrastructure .. The second property was a similar size to the property at 255 Reservoir Road Waurn Ponds. In addition, during the late 1980’s Mike had responsibility (as a consultant) for overseeing the redevelopment of a property a few kilometers from Reservoir Road at Gnarwarre. Mike does not have the knowledge or experience to comment on the effect of possible changes to the hydrology of the area as a consequence of the proposed train stabling and maintenance facility. 2. Expert witness documents and declaration I Michael (Mike) Richard Stephens of 96 Harbours Road, Yendon Vic 3352, have read, understand and agree to comply with the Planning Panels Expert witness code and agree to be bound by it; and I declare that have made all inquiries which I believe are desirable and appropriate, and no matters of significance which I regard as relevant have, to my knowledge, been withheld from the Panel. …………………………… Mike Stephens Senior Consultant 28/1/2020 Waurn Ponds Stabling and Maintenance Facility – Mike Stephens Expert witness Report 01/02/20 3 3. Background Rail Projects Victoria (RPV) is responsible for delivering the Regional Rail Revival (RRR) programs of work on behalf of the State of Victoria. RPV wishes to establish a train stabling and maintenance facility (Proposed Facility) at Waurn Ponds. RPV has lodged a Planning Scheme Amendment (PSA GC 104) for the project and requested the Minister use powers to prepare, adopt and approve the PSA (GC 104). A panel hearing is planned for mid to late February 2020. There have been many submissions and objections to the proposed facility at Waurn Ponds. Many of the submissions relate to the impact on agricultural production on the farm which would be acquired. Other submissions relate to the impact on the agricultural output of the district and of the impact in terms of noise, light and road traffic. An agricultural impact assessment has been carried out by A. J. Pitt of Ag Challenge. This report assessed the impact of the Proposed Facility on the property – 255 Reservoir Road, Waurn Ponds. I have reviewed that report and also had a brief inspection of the property accompanied by the landowner, his daughter, his solicitor and RPV’s solicitor on 14 November 2019. The residence and driveway of the property are shown in figure 1. Figure 1: Residence and driveway of property at 255 Reservoir Road, Waurn Ponds The family run a merino wool growing self-replacing flock of approximately 10,000 DSE’s1. A DSE is a standard unit used in southern Australia to compare the feed 1 See table Appendix1 Waurn Ponds Stabling and Maintenance Facility – Mike Stephens Expert witness Report 01/02/20 4 requirements of different classes of stock or to assess the carrying capacity and potential productivity of a given farm or area of grazed land. The nature of the management of a self-replacing flock is that there are set operations carried out at various times during the year. The only sheep that are brought onto the property are rams. Those rams are joined to ewes for lambing which occurs annually. Sheep are shorn annually in November. In addition to the work involved in preparing sheep for lambing and shearing other husbandry procedures occur during the year. These procedures include crutching (shearing the wool from the breech of the sheep) and drenching (the application of medicines to ensure that internal parasites are controlled). In some flocks sheep are dipped (thoroughly soaked with chemical) to control external parasites. The nature of these operations require the sheep to be brought to the covered yards and / or shearing shed several times a year. Each time the sheep are brought to the shearing shed they need to cross the railway line. The description of the business, and its operation, in the Pitt report is consistent with my understanding of the business and its operation. The general layout of 255 Reservoir Road is shown in Figure 2 with the boundary marked in yellow. Note that the Geelong Warrnambool railway line intersects the northern end of the property running in a south westerly (approximately) direction. In addition to the land shown below the landowner leases a parcel of land to the east of the owned land. I understand that the total grazing area is approximately 700 hectares of which 480 hectares is freehold and 220 hectares is leasehold. The property is subdivided into several paddocks but more importantly is made up of three ‘parcels’ of land which would be contiguous if they were not separated by roads. The leased land is a fourth parcel. The parcels of land can be described as: Central: which is dissected by the Geelong Warranbool railway line and lies between Reservoir Road (north), Bogans Lane (east) Mt. Duneed Road (south) and Pettavel Road (west). South: which is on the southern side of Mt Duneed Road. West: which is on the western side of Pettavel Road. Lease: which is on the eastern side of Bogans Lane. Waurn Ponds Stabling and Maintenance Facility – Mike Stephens Expert witness Report 01/02/20 5 Figure 2: Google image of the property The majority of the infrastructure on the property, including the house, shearing shed, stock yards and silos, is situated to the north of the Geelong Warrnambool railway line. The covered yards and shearing shed are visible in Figure 3 and the majority of the infrastructure can be seen in Figure 4. Because of the location of the stock yards and shearing shed it is necessary to walk sheep across the railway line to the yards and shearing shed in order to shear and crutch them. Other husbandry tasks may be carried out at the shearing shed yards or at a second set of yards to the south of the railway line. As well as the need to move sheep and machinery across the railway line it is a matter of routine to move sheep across the roads (Bogans Lane, Mt Duneed Road, and Pettavel Road). These sheep movements may be for husbandry tasks or to ensure that paddocks are stocked appropriately to utilize the available feed. Waurn Ponds Stabling and Maintenance Facility – Mike Stephens Expert witness Report 01/02/20 6 Figure 3: Covered sheep yards and shearing shed (photo taken from north) Figure 4: Google image of part of the property where the majority of the infrastructure is located. Waurn Ponds Stabling and Maintenance Facility – Mike Stephens Expert witness Report 01/02/20 7 The existing within property level crossing is shown in Figure 5. Note that there are presently no holding or forcing yards at this crossing (Figure 5). Figure 5: Existing railway crossing. Photo taken from south, Farm sheds appear in the background. 4. My Understanding of the Request / Instructions I have been instructed by Ashurst Australia to: (a) Review the exhibited PSA GC 104 material relevant to your [my] area of expertise; (b) Prepare an expert witness statement which addresses the matters set out in section 4.2 below. (c) Identify any further information relevant to your [my] assessment, which you [I] require to complete your [my] expert witness statement. (d) Appear as a witness at the hearing of the project. The scope of expert witness statement requests that it: (a) Assesses the agricultural productivity of the land that would accommodate the proposed Waurn Ponds Stabling and Maintenance Facility; (b) Assesses the impact of the proposed Waurn Ponds Stabling and Maintenance Facility on the ongoing operation of the farm that is presently situated at 255 Reservoir Road, Waurn Ponds, and that is operated by and (c) Identifies means by which the impacts of the proposed Waurn Ponds Stabling and Maintenance Facility of the productivity of the farm could be ameliorated; Waurn Ponds Stabling and Maintenance Facility – Mike Stephens Expert witness Report 01/02/20 8 (d) Includes a brief section summarising the concerns raised in the Public Submissions in relation to agricultural impacts and your [my] opinion in response to those concerns; and (e) Is compliant with the Expert Evidence Guide attached at Annexure A to this letter.
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