Greater Dandenong Council will advocate for a multi-deck car park near Sandown Railway Station.
At their Monday 24 July meeting, councillors also agreed to ask the State Government to consider signalising the Heatherton Road-Lightwood Road-Douglas Street intersection as part of Level Crossing Removal Project works.
“We’re passing onto the State Government what the people of Noble Park and, moreover, Greater Dandenong, want,” Cr Roz Blades said.
The motion followed a review into the Level Crossing Removal Authority’s (LXRA) performance over the past 12 months in removing the Heatherton, Corrigan and Chandler road level crossings.
The report provides commentary on the emerging benefits and implications and said that the LXRA had “demonstrated proactive improvement in its community consultation and engagement during the design and works implementation phases of the project”.
It said there were ongoing discussions between the council, LXRA and other stakeholders including VicRoads, PTV and VicTrack about design outcomes.
“We’re joining up Ian Street and Leonard Avenue,” Cr Blades said.
“How long have we waited to bring Ian Street into Noble Park?
“They’ve been cut off for years by this level crossing.”
But Cr Tim Dark said the sky rail project was building “a permanent wall between two sides of Noble Park”.
Cr Dark said the LXRA was blowing its budget and ducking for cover, “ripping off the residents of the City of Greater Dandenong”.
He was concerned that native trees would be replaced with “lilly pilly” and a proposed playground would be no more than a couple of benches.
Cr Matthew Kirwan said he shared some of Cr Dark’s concerns but that the project was going to have “great benefits for our residents”.
“Tonight we’re not debating the elevated rail project,” he said.
“We’re debating how we respond as a council to it to get the best possible result for our residents.
“This report sends a strong message to our community.”
