By Casey Neill
The Committee for Dandenong has welcomed rumours that Amazon may be setting up a warehouse in Dandenong South.
“Amazon, my understanding is, they want to get to half of the population within half an hour,” acting chairman James Sturgess said.
“If that’s their mantra, there is no place other than Dandenong for them to be.
“Most of the population’s out here.
“We’re already as big as Adelaide.”
The US online retail giant’s PR team said there was nothing to share at this time despite several advertisements for Amazon jobs in Dandenong South.
“We don’t know that they’re coming,” Mr Sturgess conceded.
“But we’d be surprised if they don’t come.
“We’ve got great road infrastructure – EastLink, the Monash, the talk about connecting the north-east link through to the Hume Highway through Craigieburn, the inland port – how important would that be?”
He said an Amazon warehouse would bring jobs to the region and hoped it would give governments a push to deliver promised and proposed infrastructure.
“The government has made lots of noises about improving infrastructure, improving the roads, building the spur line for the inland port, building the overpass at Abbotts Road,” he said.
“The government needs to confirm those things and commit to those things.”
Amazon revealed in April that it was making plans to “bring a retail offering to Australia”.
“We are excited to bring thousands of new jobs to Australia, millions of dollars in additional investment, and to empower small Australian businesses through Amazon Marketplace,” a company statement said at the time.
