PROTECTING THE YARRA RIVER (BIRRARUNG) Ministerial Advisory Committee Final Report Prepared by: Yarra River Protection Ministerial Advisory Committee © The State of Victoria Department of Environment, Land, Water & Planning 2016 This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence. You are free to re-use the work under that licence, on the condition that you credit the State of Victoria as author. The licence does not apply to any images, photographs or branding, including the Victorian Coat of Arms, the Victorian Government logo and the Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning (DELWP) logo. 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This document is also available on the internet at www.delwp.vic.gov.au PROTECTING THE YARRA RIVER (BIRRARUNG) Ministerial Advisory Committee Final Report Acknowledgement The Yarra River Protection Ministerial Advisory Committee proudly acknowledges Victoria’s Aboriginal communities and their rich culture, and pays respect to their Elders past and present. We acknowledge Aboriginal people as Australia’s first peoples and as the Traditional Owners and custodians of the land and water on which we rely. We recognise the intrinsic connection of Traditional Owners to Country and value their contribution to managing the land, water, natural and built landscapes. We acknowledge the ongoing contribution this makes to the Yarra River catchment. We support the need for genuine and lasting partnerships with Traditional Owners to understand their culture and connections to Country in the way we plan for and manage the Yarra River corridor and its environment. We embrace the spirit of reconciliation, working towards equity for Traditional Owners. 2 For more information about planning 2 For more information about planning Ministerial Advisory Committee Final Report Foreword Victoria has been a leader in Domain edged by the boulevard of “The Yarra River planning and managing waterways, St Kilda Road. To the east, Treasury catchments and open spaces and and Fitzroy Gardens and the more Protection in regulating urban development utilitarian Yarra Park and Gosch’s Ministerial Advisory and industry to ensure we enjoy Paddock now home to Melbourne’s the healthy environment that is famous sports and entertainment Committee (Yarra fundamental to our liveability and precinct. To the north, Carlton prosperity. The effectiveness of our Gardens, later to be graced with MAC) recognises institutions and the outcomes they the bold and startling presence of have delivered for Melbourne and the Royal Exhibition Building and that the Yarra River our region are the envy of other beyond, the huge expanse of Royal Australian capital cities. Indeed Park and Princes Park connected by and its parklands many other cities around the world the majestic, tree-lined boulevard are a magnificent have looked to Melbourne for of Royal Parade. At the same time examples to follow. But we should we constructed one of the world’s natural asset that not be complacent. Melbourne’s earliest sewerage systems and population is growing rapidly and reserved the forested headwaters of is highly valued by we must ensure that the Yarra River, the Yarra River for our water supply. or Birrarung in the language of the And so, together with profound the community” Traditional Owners, remains healthy social and cultural changes, and its many values can be enjoyed our shambolic frontier town by future generations. transformed in a relatively brief period into ‘Marvellous Melbourne’. There are lessons to be learned from the past. This is not the first Remarkably little investment in time Melbourne has faced a period open spaces and infrastructure of rapid population growth that occurred in the following decades. has put pressure on infrastructure, The First World War, Depression services and the environment. and Second World War were times of austerity and sacrifice. The Melbourne’s European settlement 1929 Plan of General Development began as little more than a for Melbourne1 contained the first shambolic frontier town. The Gold vision of green open spaces along Rush, the subsequent population Melbourne’s waterways but little and property booms and the was done to put it into effect. The lack of city services in the 19th 1956 Olympics was perhaps the century led to Melbourne gaining event that signalled Melbourne’s an international reputation as awakening from that somewhat ‘Smellbourne’. But then over several bleak period. It was again time decades, visionary plans set aside for optimism and vision, and an arc of green open spaces around Melbourne’s population was again the Hoddle Grid. To the south of the booming. By the 1970s sprawling Yarra River the Botanic Gardens, development had virtually doubled Alexandra Gardens and Kings the extent of the metropolitan area. 1 . Plan for General Development (Metropolitan Town Planning Commission), 1929. The Plan of General Development was a planning scheme to prevent ‘misuse’ of land and protect property values. It also identified a number of issues such as traffic congestion and recognised the value of Melbourne’s waterways as an open space network. Post-war scarcity meant services Melbourne is now experiencing to consider institutional reforms such as the sewerage system had its third great wave of population to implement the next wave of not kept up. The Yarra River, our growth. So far we have been able planning and investment in open waterways and Port Phillip Bay were to sustain our liveability and spaces and natural assets to neglected and becoming grossly a reasonably healthy natural underpin Melbourne’s liveability as polluted. environment largely because of the we grow. legacy of planning and investment The city’s planners revived the undertaken more than 40 years It has been a privilege to be given earlier vision for Melbourne’s open ago. But we should be concerned. the task of undertaking this review space network along with the idea Sustaining or improving liveability over the last nine months. We of green wedges and development as Melbourne’s population grows acknowledge the support of the Yarra corridors. There was community to more than 7 million over the next River Protection Program team within pressure to tackle pollution 35 years is a massive challenge the Department of Environment, problems caused by industry and that will require a vision, and a Land, Water and Planning and thank unsewered suburbs. Slowly the sustained commitment to deliver team members for their hard work momentum began to build behind it by successive governments over and professionalism. We also thank the vision and greater prosperity many decades. the many individuals, groups and and community expectations agencies that met with the Yarra sustained the investment needed The Yarra River Protection Ministerial MAC, attended workshops or made to deliver it. The Environment Advisory Committee (Yarra MAC) submissions. Protection Authority Victoria was recognises that the Yarra River and created to regulate industry. It its parklands are a magnificent There is no doubt about the care was only the second environment natural asset that is highly valued by people have for the Yarra and the protection agency to be created the community. We should not take concern they have for its future. in the world. A huge investment by for granted the effort that has been There is also a passion to reveal state and federal governments was required to create this asset or the more of its history and heritage, to made in sewering the suburbs. A effort needed to ensure it remains understand and enhance its many new Metropolitan Plan2 identified healthy and continues to serve a values and to ensure a greater open space corridors for our growing population. role for Traditional Owners and the waterways including the Yarra community in its management. River and government started The Yarra MAC also recognises that We commend this report to the acquiring land to build this open the challenges facing the Yarra are Minister for Planning, the Minster space network and the trail system shared by all of Melbourne’s open for Water, the Minister for Energy, that connects it. This period stands spaces and waterways including Environment and Climate Change, out as Melbourne’s second great the bay. We believe that many and the people of the Yarra wave of visionary planning and of the recommendations in this (Birrarung) and our region. investment and it has left us with a report should be considered in the wonderful legacy of a world-class light of this broader challenge. We open space network, much of it have, therefore, gone beyond our Yarra River Protection built around our waterways and the terms of reference to recommend Ministerial Advisory Committee bay. Victoria became known as the a Taskforce to develop a vision Chris Chesterfield, Chair ‘Garden State’ principally because and strategy for all of Melbourne’s Eamonn Moran PSM QC of Melbourne’s extensive network of open spaces, including parklands, Professor Jane Doolan green open spaces. waterways, coasts and bays and Kirsten Bauer 2 . Planning Policies for Metropolitan Melbourne (Melbourne and Metropolitan Board of Works), 1971.