FRANKSTON Council’s metropolitan activity centre structure plan is set to be finalised in June.
The draft FMAC structure plan outlines council’s vision for the city centre in the next 20 years. It will include updated planning controls for the Frankston area.
Many critics of the FMAC structure plan oppose its “preferred building heights”, which can be exceeded at council’s discretion. The highest preferred building height in the latest draft FMAC structure plan is 54 metres.
Frankston Council held a special meeting last Wednesday to hear submissions from members of the public on the draft structure plan. Before Wednesday’s meeting 17 written submissions were made to council on the plan – 12 were in opposition. Just one written submission supported the plan as is without changes.
15 people spoke at the meeting to voice their opinion.
Frankston mayor Nathan Conroy defended the FMAC structure plan from its objectors. He said Nepean Highway in its current state “is not a place we can be proud of.”
“At the end of the day I want my family, my friends, my mother coming over from Ireland, my child, I want everyone to be proud of where they come from. And I don’t think a lot of people are proud when you drive through Nepean Highway,” he said. “I think when we do this structure plan it gives us a vision for the next 20 years. It gives us the foundation and one thing I ran on is giving us the foundation, the strategic direction to build a city that every single person is proud of. I think we will do that with our FMAC structure plan.”
Councillor Steven Hughes, who has recently returned from a suspension, was more cautious about the plan. He said, “we can’t do things that are going to jeopardise Frankston and we can’t do things that are going to risk our potential for greatness.”
Councillor Brad Hill said “people who grew up here want to stay in Frankston. But we can’t extend into the Green Wedge, we can’t extend out at Baxter as that land is unavailable for residential, it has to happen here [in Frankston’s city centre].”
The tense council meeting stretched for more than three hours. It was temporarily stopped after an hour to throw out a serial disruptor. After the meeting resumed, the mayor condemned members of the public who have been hurling abuse at councillors from the gallery in recent times.
Critics of the draft FMAC structure plan are concerned about how it may help progress plans for high-rise developments along Nepean Highway (“Residents fear a great wall is coming” The Times 6/3/23).
The draft FMAC structure plan has been in the works for years and will replace the 2015 structure plan.
Council officers will consider the submissions and will present the final revised FMAC structure plan to councillors at their June meeting.
To finalise the changes councillors will also need to vote to request authorisation from the planning minister to commence a planning scheme amendment to implement the structure plan into the Frankston planning scheme.