HAVE YOUR SAY: Rossdale GC start Phase 2 community consultation

POSTED ON July 16, 2024 @ 3:23 pm

The Rossdale Golf Club (The Club) in Aspendale (City of Kingston), 25 kilometres south-east from the Melbourne CBD has been facing significant financial pressures and faces imminent closure. The Club’s financial bottom line is not able to fund the ongoing needs and capital requirements needed for long term viability at the current site.

The Club has had to implement various short-term solutions to address immediate funding needs, including the sale of some land (2,400 square metres) in 2015. Additional options have also been explored, such as merging with other clubs, however these were not viable.

The current finances are insufficient to meet the Club’s needs, which when combined with increasing business costs, leads to the clear conclusion that the Club ‘as is’ has no long-term viability at the current Aspendale site. Looking forward, the cost of improving the golf course to incorporate contemporary design standards and facilities is beyond the Club’s reach.

The Club has no choice other than seeking to exit, selling its land and use the money to seek a new golf facility opportunity for its members. On 23 December 2018, by Special Resolution of the Rossdale Golf Club members, over 90% of meeting attendees resolved to sell the Club’s site and explore relocation to a nearby location.

The Club has engaged an expert project team to investigate how the current Rossdale Golf Course site in Aspendale may be redeveloped in the future. This redevelopment will fund the Club’s relocation and enable it to repay its debts.

The Club acknowledges there will be significant change which may be of concern to local residents and community members. As part of this plan, we are committed to delivering community benefits for the Aspendale community.

New community assets may include:

Providing publicly accessible open spaces.
Reducing risks of off-site flood impacts by building on-site water retention basins.
Providing a range of housing opportunities for diverse family types
Providing on-site community facilities or education facilities
Providing monetary contributions towards the upgrading of existing off-site neighbourhood sporting facilities.

Planning guidelines

They have nearly completed the initial stages of the planning process including a detailed site analysis, ensuring that we have thoroughly addressed matters required under Steps 1-4 of the Planning Guidelines.

They have now commenced Step 6 of the Planning Guidelines: Provide a land use concept that delivers net community benefit along with ongoing community consultation (Step 5).

Also of relevance to Your Future Rossdale are Kingston Council’s recently approved residential zones / planning rules which cover everything from affordable homes to sustainable housing development and much more.

Next steps

Your feedback on the Ideas Plan will inform the finalisation of our proposal before the Club formally lodges a request to rezone and develop the site with the Kingston Council.

https://yourfuturerossdale.com.au/