By Cam Lucadou-Wells
The race is on to preserve an idyllic residential estate around Cardinia Close in Dandenong North.
Greater Dandenong Council is set to investigate rezoning the area abutting Police Paddocks Reserve to prevent “inappropriate” and “intense” developments.
The move comes after the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal rejected a proposal for 16 townhouses towering up to three storeys on an elevated site at 11 Cardinia Close.
It had been opposed by the council and 116 public objectors – a vast majority of the estate’s residents.
Bob Miles, a resident in the estate for 26 years, was part of the close-knit neighbourhood’s two-year fight against the “ridiculous” plan.
“It doesn’t blend in. It’s totally out of character for what we have here – it would destroy it.”
He’d bought the neighbouring vacant block to preserve the picturesque outlook of horse agistments, forested hills, bike tracks and the bush-lined Dandenong Creek.
It’s a highly sought-after area – in which many residents have dwelled for decades.
“You can see what we have here,” he says proudly.
“We thought we could lose all this.”
He first caught on that something was up when the site’s former home sold for about $2.3 million a few years ago. That was an over-valuing of about $500,000, Mr Miles thought.
The home on a 4191-square-metre lot was first occupied by the late builder and businessman Ron Rado, who founded Gumbuya Park.
On 12 April, councillor Bob Milkovic moved to change the area’s General Residential Zone which put it at risk of over-development.
He wanted the rezoning to the lower-density Neighbourhood Residential Zone to ensure “this sort of nonsense never happens again”.
Residents went to “hell and back” fighting against the townhouses, he said.
“We are not anti-development but we’re anti- over-development or gross over-development.”
The area is bounded by Stud Road, Brady Road and Cardinia Close, and adjoins Police Paddocks Reserve.
Planning director Jody Bosman said the estate backed Stud Road but was not typical of residential areas fronting major arterials in the GRZ.
He said the council would explore rezoning Cardinia Close because it was not directly accessed by Stud Road, nor was it close to activity centres and public transport.
A council report on the issue is expected to be tabled by September.
