By David Ettershank
A small community is fighting to protect a green corridor visited and loved by western Melburnians.
The town of Little River is campaigning to stop the construction of a $3 billion transport hub on land next to the Western Grassland Reserve and upstream from internationally significant wetlands.
Pacific National wants to build a freight terminal on a 550-hectare site that would handle two million shipping containers a year. The hub would take 25 years to build and stand 25 metres high.
Little River, with a population of 1400, has formed an action group and 4800 people have signed a petition opposing the terminal which would operate 24 hours a day seven days a week.
Legalise Cannabis MP David Ettershank says a mega-freight terminal does not belong on one of Melbourne’s 12 green wedges, identified by the Planning and Environmental Act, as a green buffer between the city and regional Victoria.
“Nobody wants the gateway to the You Yangs turned into an industrial wasteland, pushing thousands of additional trucks daily through the western suburbs,” Mr Ettershank said.
“We don’t need another foreign multi-national corporation carving up high conservation land, for company profit. Now it’s crunch time, are we going to protect these environmental buffers or just build to the edges of our national parks?”
Pacific National, owned by a consortium which includes US investment fund GIP, Canada’s Pension Plan Investment Board, and China’s CIC, is negotiating with the Malaysian landowners to develop the terminal and seeking state and federal government approval.
“The logic of developing this site is largely non-existent – it was designed to be close to the Western Intermodal Freight Terminal at Truganina, deferred indefinitely, and the Outer Metro Ring Road, not even on the development radar,” Mr Ettershank said.
“We call on the Allan Government to live up to its conservation commitments and show Pacific National the door.”
Little River Action Group President Adrian Hamilton said if the terminal is built 1500 trucks would pass through or near his town every day.
“Why are they proposing an industrial freight monolith in the centre of a fragile and threatened ecology?” he said.
“In the 1970s government put these green buffers around Melbourne to keep the city’s air clean. The green wedges are designed to buffer farmland from urban contaminants.
“We moved here knowing that this land should not be developed. This freight terminal would kill our town.”
The Grassy Plains Network, part of the Victorian National Parks Association, the National Trust of Australia and leading ecologists are concerned about the loss of rare volcanic grasslands and native animals.
Grassy Plains Network facilitator Adrian Marshall said there had not been a proper environmental assessment of the site.
“The freight terminal would destroy more than 40 hectares, around 75 football fields, of rare volcanic plain grassland and sit on a river system feeding into Ramsar wetlands,” he said
“99 per cent of Victoria’s native grasslands have been destroyed. Why remove more? Endangered native animals have also been seen close to the site.”
“And, a fire or toxic spill at the terminal could feed into the western Ramsar wetlands. These wetlands have large numbers of waterbirds, including migratory shorebirds and a breeding colony of the Australian Pelican.”
David Ettershank is the Member for Western Metropolitan. He can by contacted by phone, 9317 5900 or email david.ettershank@parliament.vic.gov.au
