Melbourne is going to get a new suburb. On Friday the Minister for Planning, Sonya Kilkenny, approved the Melton East Precinct Structure Plan, which sets out a community of nearly 12,000 homes on the western fringe. Once it is finished, the government expects more than 36,000 people to live there.
The important qualifier comes in the same announcement: the full precinct is to be developed "over the next 20 to 30 years". What was approved on Friday is the planning framework that lets developers start seeking permits. No one is moving in this year, or next.
What the plan contains
Alongside the homes, the precinct is planned to carry seven schools, four community hubs, shopping, and — in the government's own unit of measurement — more than five MCGs worth of parks and reserves. It is expected to support around 1,600 jobs.
The infrastructure list is where a greenfield suburb either works or does not: three new arterial roads, 14 intersections, five bridges, and cycling and pedestrian links. The plan is to be delivered in two stages, which the government says will ensure "homes are built as infrastructure is built" — the sequencing that outer-suburban residents have historically had most cause to complain about.
Melton East sits inside a larger commitment. The government describes it as part of a ten-year greenfields plan intended to complete the planning groundwork for 180,000 new homes over the decade.
A second precinct, and this one is open for comment
The same announcement opened public consultation on the draft Merrifield North Precinct Structure Plan — a 970-hectare jobs precinct in the Northern Growth Corridor, which the government says could support more than 4,700 jobs in warehousing, transport and logistics. That one is not settled yet: submissions are open at engage.vic.gov.au.
What is already there
The government lists several things it says are under way around Melton: electrification works on the Melton line, which it describes as now level crossing free; the Melton Hospital under construction; and upgrades to roads and schools. Those are its own characterisations of its own record, and this masthead has not independently checked them.
"We're unlocking space to deliver thousands of more homes – as we deliver the infrastructure these communities need," Kilkenny said. Steve McGhie, the Member for Melton, put the local version of it: "We are delivering the infrastructure needed to the west so more families can call Melton home."
Precinct structure plans are among the least glamorous documents in Victorian government, and among the most consequential. This one decides, decades ahead, where roughly 36,000 people will live, which roads they will use and how far their children will travel to school. It is worth reading the map now, because by the time anything is standing there the decisions will be a long way behind us. The Victorian Planning Authority publishes an interactive status map of completed precinct structure plans, and of current and future precincts, across Melbourne’s growth corridors.
