Camberwell residents have revealed their plans for the future of the Camberwell Junction precinct after the government ceded all planning powers over the area to a local residents’ group.
The dramatic development came as the government announced a range of fast-tracking measures in response to the Global Financial Crisis. “Now, more than ever, we need to be acting decisively to ensure certainty for jobs and investment,” said Planning Minister Justin Madden. “At such a time the last thing we need to be doing is wasting time with a political black hole like the Camberwell Junction.”
He announced that planning powers for the Camberwell Junction would therefore be immediately turned over to the local residents’ group Boroondarians Against All (BAA). “This will send as clear a signal to the market as possible that Camberwell is off-limits, thus freeing up valuable investment capital for more productive areas,” the Minister said.
BAA president Portia Hyphen-Audi welcomed the decision. “The government has become out of control and undemocratic,” she said. “This decision will see a welcome return to accountability, good governance, and the 1950s.”
The association has been quick to roll-out their plans for the newly designated Principal Inactivity Centre. Decisions on planning applications will be made by a newly formed Development Arrestment Committee, which Hyphen-Audi says will include expert members drawn “from all walks of life: surgeons, QCs, and representatives of the expatriate arts community.”
Key to the new planning framework for the junction will be a new structure plan respecting the importance to the area of the current Camberwell Station carpark. The site would gain heritage protection, meaning its existing combination of open-lot carparking, high voltage electrical wires, cyclone fencing, razor wire, rubbish-strewn landscaping, billboard signage and struggling retail tenancies will be preserved for future generations to enjoy.
Critics have said that the rejection of development plans for the site is elitist and foregoes opportunities for affordable housing. Hyphen-Audi counters that affordability is not an existing element of Camberwell’s neighbourhood character, and that, in any case, “the area is not beyond the financial means of anyone who has done just one or two Pirates of the Caribbean movies.”
Originally published in the “Clause 101” Column in Planning News 35, no. 4 (May 2009): 30.