‘A shared pathway too far’

IT WAS déjà vu for Inverloch as the ongoing saga for a shared pathway on Surf Parade sees no end in sight.

The issue, which has dragged on for years, came to another head with dozens of residents from Inverloch and surrounds attending a community meeting on Saturday, October 21.

With most of the shared path now complete, the final stage (3b) remains a point of contention.

Bass Coast Shire recently revealed two new options for stage 3b, which is planned to continue from Ozone Street and finish at Goroke Street near the Surf Lifesaving Club.

The community was again asked to provide feedback on the proposals which saw two options put forward: 

• Option 1 – Parking and one-way vehicle traffic on Surf Parade between Ozone Street and Goroke Street (road traffic to travel west-bound, away from Inverloch)

• Option 2 – No parking provision. Retain two-way vehicle traffic on Surf Parade.

According to the shire’s Engage website, due to the extensive erosion impacting the Inverloch coast and state government led work to manage erosion in this area, ‘it is no longer an option to remove vegetation’. 

‘As we are unable to remove any further vegetation outside of the road reserve there is not enough space to allow for a path, parking and two-way traffic,’ the site states.

The decision is now expected to be voted on at the November council meeting.

Stage 3b was also postponed at a council meeting earlier this year in March, to ensure ‘all options were exhausted and the coastal vegetation was preserved’.

The initial plan, endorsed by council in 2019, involved ‘significant’ native coastal vegetation removal, which the Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Change (DEECA) did not support.

It was previously reported that a major consideration in DECCA rejecting the original plan tied to the challenges within the findings of the Cape-to-Cape Resilience Project, which highlighted among other things the significant erosion and forecasted sea level rising, making the ‘provision of parking ill-advised’ in such an environmentally sensitive area.

Proposal angst 

However, the latest options for the shared path have outraged some Inverloch community members, with a petition put forward for the path to be built with parking and two-way traffic, given the extensive consultation and proposals put forward in 2019.

The Inverloch RSL hall was packed full of community members who met to discuss the plans and demonstrate to council the strong support for a footpath, parking and two-way traffic.

Kim White and Fiona McMahon-Hughes led the session with attendees given the opportunity to discuss concerns or aspects of the proposals.

Mr White said the community had been waiting for “two decades” for a footpath to be completed.

“We’ve just got 500 metres left to go, just 500m, but we would really like to see it done properly,” he said.

“From a personal perspective, am I going to in 20 years’ time drive down to Surf Parade and think to myself, we didn’t act properly or quick enough to try and get the best possible result.”

He highlighted the frustrations of the options changing despite the community strongly voting for the preferred pathway in 2019.

Fiona added there had been ‘nowhere near’ the amount of consultation compared to previous years, and that it was being pushed through before the November meeting.

During the session, it was stated that the removal of vegetation would only affect the 500-metre strip, and that much of the vegetation had grown back in previously completed sections of the path.

One attendee highlighted that according to their own research, almost 27,000 square metres had been lost to erosion in the past decade, which ‘no one had bat an eyelid to’.

It was stated that all councillors had been invited to the meeting, but Cr Leticia Laing was the only one in attendance, who bravely fronted the crowds’ tough questions.

Cr Laing explained council’s decision to defer the pathway in March this year, highlighting it is a very complex issue.

“In 2019, there was incredible amounts of support for the two-way option with parking,” she said.

“Now since that time, we’ve had an extensive amount of work undertaken on the Inverloch coastline from Cape Paterson to Cape Liptrap through the Cape-to-Cape Resilience Project.

“I do want to highlight that portion of land is not council land, so we have to go to DECCA to get permission to undertake the project.

“And since then, we’ve had an extensive amount of funding and budgets and coastal erosion projects and dune nourishment to understand what’s happening on the dynamic Inverloch coastline.”

It was also highlighted that the state government is exploring whether they will develop infrastructure on coastlines due to the ‘inevitable inundation’.

To view the council plans for stage 3b, visit engage.basscoast.vic.gov.au/surfpde