Frankston Bypass
LMA (was SEITA) Bulldozers trash bushland from Westerfield to the Pines
Community Concerns over Minister Gate-Crashing Inquiry (Melbourne Parliament)
When the Standing Committee on Finance and Public Administration hearing convened to hear from Peta Duke on 12 March 2010, she did not attend in answer to the summons. She had written the notorious Media Plan proposing a sham public consultation process to earn favour with the electorate.
SEITA tollway using old data on oil prices
by Sheila Newman and Richard Laverack
Why build more roads now?
Why on earth, with petroleum supplies not meeting demand and oil prices through the roof, are we still engaging in public-private partnerships with road builders???
Victorian Biodiversity Green Paper signals Black Day for Biodiversity
Submission in response to the Victorian Government’s Land and Biodiversity at a Time of Climate Change Green Paper
Roads to wildlife extinction: Vic Government, SEITA, Eastlink, in Victoria's South East
SEITA is the acronym for the Victorian Southern and Eastern Integrated Transport Authority which was formed by the Victorian Government to manage private public partnerships to build ... um... not free ways, but tollways. The Frankston bypass is part of the EastLink tollway.
Wildlife Campaigner: "SEITA preferred Frankston bypass route will severely impact wildife"
Maryland Wilson, President of the Australian Wildlife Protection Council, stated yesterday that the Southern and Eastern Integrated Transport Authority (SEITA) has failed to adequately address the concerns she raised on behalf of the Australian Wildlife Protection Council or the Coalition of Wildlife Corridors.
Australian Wildlife Protection Council submission to the SEITA concerning the Frankston Bypass
To: Ken Mathers, Chief Executive Officer, SEITA, admin [AT] seita.com.au
Cc: Tim Pallas, Minister for Roads and Ports tim.pallas [AT] parliament.vic.gov.au.
Cc: Martin Pakula, martin.pakula [AT] parliamentvic.gov.au
Cc. Joel Benjamin, Biodiversity Vic Roads, joel.benjamin [AT] roads.vic.gov.au
Cc: Bruno Aleksic, Manager Planning, bruno.aleksic [AT] doi.vic.gov.au
May 14, 2008
Dear Mr Mathers,
RE: SEITA - FRANKSTON BYPASS: Seita Ref: DO1072588
Your response (Seita ref: DO1072588) fails to adequately address the concerns I raised on behalf of the Australian Wildlife Protection Council or the Coalition of Wildlife Corridors. These concerns were specifically about the threat posed to wildlife and their habitat by the infrastructure and traffic which will be created if the SEITA proposed bypass route goes ahead.
Our own observation as well as discussion with persons well-informed in road-engineering, population and land-use planning, Peninsula Biosphere maintenance, wildlife-ecology and social amenity leaves us in no doubt that
a) the proposed route will severely impact on scarce habitat for local, regional and State biodiversity
b) SEITA and the government have not seriously examined viable alternatives
c) Pines draft master plan - part two and part three fail to remedy these problems
d) Pines draft master plan suggestion of a connection between the parts of the Reserve it will split would only present a very insignificant mitigation of the overall drastic damage
e) the proposed restructuring and popularisation of the reserves inaccurately markets new and additional habitat-stress as habitat and wildlife friendly
The proposed route will divide the Peninsula in two, making any hope of interconnecting wildlife corridors extremely difficult, if not impossible.
It is not acceptable for the government or its chosen contractors to go ahead with a structure which, despite some rhetorically supportive policies in Pines draft master plans, parts two and three, is in practice oppositional to international, Australian, and local practice and science for protecting the needs of wildlife. At the moment Frankston and the Peninsula, although part of an international UNESCO agreement for a biosphere that protects fauna and flora, are facing unacceptable decimation of indigenous animals in all or most areas where they struggle to survive. Roads, through habitat fragmentation and isolation, through very high rates of road-kill, and through their spear-heading of suburban expansion, are the drivers of animal deaths and species loss.
SEITA will only encounter and should only encounter opposition if it fails to use alternative routes to protect any indigenous fauna habitat from being cut off from the rest of the Pines, or indeed where similar fragmentation is threatened for any other habitats. Australian fauna is at greater risk than at any other time in history due to climate change, drought, habitat-fragmentation and annihilation. The need for more, not fewer, bio-links to save species and individual animals is critical.
With regards to the other areas of Frankston and the Peninsula, if SEITA continues with the same lack of awareness as previous road-builders in this country, of the many modern methods for mitigating road-kill, such as bridges, tunnels and overpasses, then it cannot expect and will not deserve support. This is quite apart from the fact that the population growth and urban expansion which it is relying on in Australia for customers and investors is not supported by the incumbent population and will probably become very problematical very soon due to oil depletion.
Sincerely,
Maryland Wilson, President
Australian Wildlife Protection Council Inc
247 Flinders Lane Melbourne, Victoria 3000
Coalition for Wildlife Corridors
03 59 788 570 ph 03 59 788 302 fax
Mobile 0417 148 501
kangaroo [AT] peninsula.hotkey.net.au
web site: www.awpc.org.au
Registered Charity A0012224D
"As long as people will shed the blood of innocent
creatures there can be no peace, no liberty, no
harmony between people. Slaughter and justice
cannot dwell together."
Nobel Prize Winner ISAAC BASHEVIS SINGER
Residents organise against Frankston Bypass
The following was sent to me by Gillian Collins
A petition against the Bypass has, so far, garnered over 900 signatures and has been presented to Parliament by Jude Perera, our local MP. Another group in South Frankston have 400 signatures on a petition that they have submitted to Southern and Eastern Integrated Transport Authority (SEITA) , and we have submitted documentation that ours have been certified by Parliament, and have asked that they be counted. Since SEITA counted the golf course petition signatures as individual submissions in the Phase One, they cannot do otherwise.
This week we brought some of the issues against the Bypass to the Frankston City Council Major Projects Committee, and I think we got a fair hearing. It looks as though there was no allocation towards it in this year's budget, but we need to look further into that.
One of the results of raising the profile of the anti-Bypass feelings is that the pro-Bypass folk are now starting to campaign. The Chamber of Commerce has a petition that looks remarkably like ours but in favour of it, and they have written to SEITA saying we are "ill-informed!" One of our local Council members is now going to the press with quite unbelievable comments about the Flora and Fauna Reserve being a "wasteland!"
We continue to work on gathering signatures on our petition and generating stories in the press. Next week we are having a community meeting at the school closest to the Reserve to celebrate biodiversity and urge our neighbours to make submissions and contact their elected representatives.
We would appreciate any submissions to the Southern and Eastern Integrated Transpoiort Authority (SEITA) web site: www.seita.com.au. Every one counts, no matter how brief.
For further information: e-mail Gillian Collins at gillianuu [AT] dodo.com.au
See also Australian Wildlife Protection Council submission to the SEITA
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