RESIDENTS fighting a proposed major development of an adventure park in Boneo have been left seething after the state’s planning minister intervened before a planned tribunal appeal. The proposal involves a $47.7 million expansion for a leisure and recreation facility at The Ranch, a 200-acre adventure park at 810 Boneo Rd, which sits within the green wedge. Under the plans, a new indoor and outdoor skateboarding facility would be added, along with mountain biking trails and BMX tracks, dry-ski snowboarding slopes, and two wakeboard lakes.
Despite the proposal attracting 107 objections, Mornington Peninsula Shire councillors granted an amended planning permit last September (Residents’ fury over $47.7m expanded sports park in green wedge, The News, 18/9/2024). The Ranch owner Jodi Neary told councillors the project would be a drawcard for visitors, providing a “fun, inclusive, safe and inspiring environment for people of all ages, abilities and backgrounds”.
But opponents have cited environmental and green wedge zone concerns, as well as visual bulk and landscape impacts and amenity impacts, and increased traffic. Among those fighting the plans for the “theme park” is Simon Stuart, a third-generation farmer who runs a beef cattle farm near the proposed facility. He along with another objector had sought to appeal the proposal at the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (VCAT). Stuart said the case was set to be heard initially with a compulsory conference at VCAT on 18 February, followed by a nine-day hearing between 28 July and 7 August. But they suffered an unexpected major blow after the state’s planning minister Sonya Kilkenny used her call-in powers to prevent the matter going to VCAT.
According to a state government letter seen by The News, Kilkenny said she had decided to call in the matter “as I consider that the proceedings raise a major issue of policy, and the determination of the proceeding may have a substantial effect on the achievement or development of planning objectives”.
Kilkenny also referred the matter to the Priority Projects Standing Advisory Committee (PPSAC) for advice and recommendations “on whether the amended planning permit should be issued and, if so, the appropriate permit conditions that should be imposed”.
The Department of Planning confirmed that the Planning Minister had called in the matter, and noted the PPSAC hearing process would be coordinated by Planning Panels Victoria with a directions hearing to be held in February. Before the hearing, committee members will consider all submissions from objecting parties before providing “fair, unbiased advice to the minister about the planning permit application”.
But Stuart said was left stunned and believed the matter had been “hijacked” by the Planning Minister and that “no reason was given for the minister’s intervention in the planning process”. He feared any conditions set “could be anything … apparently it’s quite open ended as far as what they can do”. “The concern is it’s a big development in a green wedge, which is supposed to be protected and preserved for future generations, and the size and scale of this is phenomenal,” Stuart said.
The state government said The Ranch proposal had received a grant through the Enabling Tourism Fund 2024 “to deliver a detailed design package and financial modelling for The Ranch world class actions sports facility”.
“This will assist the facility to reach investment-ready status,” it said in a statement, but stopped short of confirming how much funding The Ranch would receive, which is understood to be $500,000.
First published in the Mornington News – 28 January 2025
