Greenways plan

By Shaun Inguanzo
GREATER Dandenong is set to become a global tourism hot spot thanks to its involvement in one of the country’s most ambitious environmental projects.
The city will be one of many of stops along the Living Links walking and bike-riding network.
Living Links is a multimillion-dollar, 30-year project that will let people walk or ride on a web of paths linking environmental wonders in Melbourne’s south east without the need to step foot in suburbia.
The project will become an environmental wonderland and a major drawcard for tourists both domestically and internationally.
Living Links will be the flagship project of the Port Phillip and Westernport Catchment Management Authority (PPWCMA) and will be backed by state and local governments, industry and recreational bodies.
A preliminary vision map of Living Links shows that people could walk or ride in a green environment from the Dandenong Ranges National Park to Frankston, Cranbourne or Narre Warren without the need to use Melbourne’s road or rail network.
The City of Greater Dandenong council is planning to convert the Dandenong floodplains into a wetlands site.
It is one of 16 short-term projects while PPWCMA establishes a masterplan that will include an anticipated 500 different projects for the Living Links network.
PPWCMA chief executive officer David Buntine said the project would inject the environment back into the urban sprawl.
“Fortunately, many of the building blocks are there,” Mr Buntine said, “like Jells Park, Shepherd’s Bush and the Bushy Park Wetlands.
“At the moment they’re isolated from each other. This is about making living links to enhance the environmental and economic attractiveness of the region.”
He likened the effect to New York’s Central Park and said people on the trail would not realise they were in the middle of suburbia.
The project will also have benefits for the local environment and for council projects which have been put on hold.
Mr Buntine said participation in the project would give environmental projects within municipalities a purpose to be completed sooner rather than later, with the promise of economic benefits generated by tourism thanks to the Living Links walking trail.
Other councils participating in the project include Casey, Knox, Monash, Maroondah, and Kingston.
PPWCMA said it was uncertain of the project’s exact cost but says it could cost tens of millions of dollars.
To fund it, the PPWCMA is calling for contributions from all levels of government and will open the Living Links paths to business sponsorship programs.