Advocacy Update – AGHS Vic Branch, June 2024
HV McKay Memorial Gardens, Sunshine
Earlier in the year, Brimbank Council advised the Gardens’ Strategic Management Committee that new contractors had been appointed for the Airport Rail Link works and revised plans would likely require a new Heritage Victoria permit. However, with the recent Victorian State budget announcement that the Airport Rail Link project has been postponed indefinitely, it should be anticipated that the current Heritage Victoria permit for the Gardens will lapse in four years.
In the meantime, meetings of the Strategic Management Committee at which AGHS is represented will be held for the remainder of 2024. Later in the year, however, its terms of reference and the 2017 Management Plan will be under review by the newly appointed Manager of Parks and Public Realm, after the restructure of the Parks Department.
Wombat Park, Daylesford
Recently AGHS were notified that there may be some detrimental changes to the gardens of this significant property. AGHS nominated Wombat Park for the Victorian Heritage Register in late 2019, but no assessment has yet been done, primarily due to the pandemic. This application has now been followed up and AGHS has been advised that it is ‘near the top’ of applications to be assessed in the next financial year. As we are close to that time now, the application will be followed up again soon.
Unfortunately, with the absence of any concrete evidence of existing or prospective changes which would help to speed up the assessment process, the existing Hepburn Shire Heritage Overlay (HO619 - includes residence, gardens, stables and HO907, HO908 - various trees) will have to be relied on to preserve the heritage of Wombat Park for the time being. No planning permit applications are currently submitted for Wombat Park (4723 Midland Highway, Daylesford), although there is one currently at VCAT for 4719 Midland Highway, Daylesford, which refers to the proposed subdivision and associated works immediately to the south, about which AGHS made a submission to the Shire council in 2023.
The Gong & Buninyong Botanic Gardens Masterplan, Buninyong
Since formally adopting their Masterplan in June 2023, Ballarat City Council has not yet provided a schedule for commencement of their proposed works at The Gong and Buninyong Botanic Gardens. Friends of the Buninyong Botanic Gardens and the community Stakeholders Advisory Group has proposed an alternative scheme proposing creation of environmentally managed wetlands that:
- leave existing dam wall and vegetation intact, thus avoiding breaching of the Gardens’ Heritage Victoria listed values.
- manage the water volume and flow into The Gong via a series of small wetland ponds above The Gong, to its east.
- allows for retention of fishing activities in The Gong, provision of habitat for bio-diversity, increased vegetation cover for shade and cooling, and management of invasive species; and
- facilitates implementation of a strategic corridor through to outlying remnant bushland.
This alternative proposal will be submitted to Heritage Victoria when the City of Ballarat formally submits its plans for approval to proceed with their works which “… will have detrimental impacts on the cultural heritage significance of the Buninyong Botanic Gardens” ref: Context – GML Heritage Consultants, Heritage Impact Statement, August 2020.
Working with National Trust (Vic)
AGHS is now represented, through the Advocacy team, on National Trust (Vic) Landscape Reference Group which meets annually.
OpenAustralia Foundation
Advocacy team note the difficulty of keeping abreast of planning proposals that may affect significant gardens and cultural landscapes in each local government area (LGA), requiring constant vigilance. PlanningAlerts is a free service run by the independent charity OpenAustralia Foundation.
We are grateful to all AGHS members not on the current committee who are active as stakeholders, in community and resident groups, in their individual LGAs and as previous submitters of applications to Heritage Victoria and other planning bodies.
Queens Avenue row of trees in Glen Eira City Council area, is case in point. Members in this LGA have assisted by making views on environmental, heritage and canopy etc. values for tree retention, compatible with cycleways and the Level Crossing Removal Authority plans. Social media fora and lobbying of GEC Councillors by individuals has been an opportunity to raise AGHS’s profile as an organisation committed to those values.
Yantaringa Gardens Project
In August 2021 the Victorian branch of the Australian Garden History Society (AGHS Vic) was approached by a resident of the Yantaringa Court apartments in Ivanhoe in search of advice on how to renovate their garden. The garden in question is a portion of what was established a century ago by local identity Sir Herbert Olney. Despite various stages of development since the early 1920s the remnant infrastructure of the garden continues; the planting schemes however, have taken many paths over the years.
AGHS (Vic) has assisted in this effort to evoke the earlier years of the garden’s glory days more closely through two stages.
Firstly, in May 2022, the Branch undertook a working bee at the site, focusing on removing overgrown elements to reveal the full impact of the hard landscape elements. Working bees have been a part of Branch activities for the past 25 years, and this event had a transformative effect on this garden. To see clearly what had been created and captured in early images was exciting for the residents.
The second stage is the subject of this report, and deals with the plantings as they are at present. It also describes how plantings and some hard features could be modified to recapture the intent at the establishment of the apartments, with some reference back to the very early era when Yantaringa was one integrated establishment, incorporating generous house, extensive gardens and bowling rinks.
This report has been put together for AGHS (Vic) by Barrie Gallacher, Landscape Architect specialising in Landscape Heritage Projects. It is fully detailed in relation to the garden layout schematics, existing plant conditions, recommendations for replacement plantings, and suggestions for some hard landscaping alterations. Residents can confidently address the project over time with such detail in hand.
AGHS (Vic) wishes to acknowledge the assistance of the Heidelberg Historical Society, who held a series of images of the property from the Olney years and the following period of establishment of the apartments. These images have been of great value in understanding the stages of the garden over these years.
Trevor Pitkin
AGHS (Vic) Projects
December 2023