Time to stop quarrying on Arthur’s Seat ridge

1 August 2021

Above: The blue area shows the 115 Boundary Road site and the red 121 Boundary Road. Picture courtesy of Peninsula Preservation Group Inc.

Industry and small business on the Peninsula is diverse. It ranges from live stock agriculture to fresh vegetable market gardens, wine and spirit processing to chocolate making and coffee roasting.

Quarrying for hard stone in the heart of Southern Peninsula should not be one of them.

Hillview Quarries Pty Ltd says the Mornington Peninsula needs a new mining site on Arthur’s Seat to service the local building industry and help keep costs down.

A new permit will see tonnes of granite blasted off the face of Arthur’s Seat ridge over the next 70 years. An area of 93 acres of untouched bushland will be cleared.

The exhaustion of the current site at Hillview Quarry Drive has brought about an application to reopen the old Pioneer site in Boundary Road Dromana. Hillview Quarries currently supplies grey and brown rock to the region and wider Victoria.

Since hard rock extractions began on Arthur’s Seat in the 1960s by the original owners ‘Pioneer’ there has been considerable urban growth in the residential corridors at the foot and lower rises of Arthurs’ Seat.

Above: View of Arthur’s Seat ridge. Courtesy of visitmorningtonpeninsula.org

In response, the community is united in voicing its disdain for any further destruction to the ridge. Industrial noise and dust, and everything else that goes with mechanical extraction is just too close for comfort the community is saying. The R E Ross Trust on the other land, owners of Hillview Quarries, prides itself in its ethical charter, which in part states:

“We recognise that every commercial decision an organisation takes involves a social consequence. We therefore commit to addressing those consequences in a way we responsibly manage our land, assets and operation, for the long-term benefit of the community to which we belong.”

So why then is Hillview Quarries seeking permission to wipe out a parcel of native vegetation on one of Victoria’s most scenic and visited landmarks, and at what cost?

Arthur’s Seat has been the site of a long drawn out battle pitting industry against the protection of indigenous fauna and flora bush land, local bayside communities, and against the popular tourist attraction that offers spectacular views across Port Phillip.

Currently, the extractive industry is facing the dilemma of diminishing supplies of construction materials unless more quarries are approved or existing operations are extended. Population growth that triggers a demand for new housing along with more major infrastructure is the driver for more quarries.

While government planners at State level want to secure sites for a good supply of extractive resources, they must also step in and terminate sites deemed no longer suitable.

And this is the dilemma for the Victorian Minister for Planning, Richard Wynne, as Hillview seeks a license to reopen an old quarry which the community believes will rip out the guts of an already badly scarred escarpment of Arthur’s Seat, leaving an irreparable blight on the landscape.

In 2018 the Minister requested an Environment Effects Statement (EES) to determine the impact on native vegetation, groundwater and surface water and oboriginal cultural heritage values. The prepared EES was expected to be lodged mid 2021, followed by a period of public exhibition and community responses. Only then will the Minister be required to make a decision.

Campaigning against the quarry is local activist group ‘Peninsula Preservation Group’ (PPG), an organisation that has attracted a ground swell of support, including high profile identities.

A major concern is the distance of the proposed quarry site to the Red Hill Primary School. PPG says the quarry will be the closest mine to a school in the whole of Victoria. EPA guidelines require a buffer zone of at least a 500 metre threshold distance when blasting, or 250 metres without blasting.

Strong community opposition to quarrying is not only gathering momentum on the Mornington Peninsula but also across the world where public opinion has swung dramatically and where governments are being told enough is enough. From Africa to Canada and UK, and to the heart of Carrara in Italy where excavation has taken place since Roman days, the focus has been turning on the irreparable damage mining does to the landscape and why it must wind down.

The ‘Committee for Peninsula’ fully supports PPG in its campaign to stop any further quarrying on the Peninsula’s historic landmark Arthur’s Seat.

For further reading: www.savearthursseat.com