NEWS DESK
Nursing home to ease family trauma A NURSING home planned at Mt Martha would help avoid trauma and problems caused when elderly people are forced to move away from their families and community. “In many cases elderly couples are separated by quite some distance when one spouse requires nursing home care offsite while the remaining spouse resides at home within [the adjacent] Koorootang or Martha’s Point [retirement villages]”, Angela Pollard said when speaking on behalf of the family which owns the land on which the nursing home is planned. “It will provide a pathway to those residents requiring the next level of care and ensure that they remain within the community that they have been a part of for so many years.” Objections have been lodged and signatures collected on a petition opposing the two-storey 108-bed nursing home near the corner of Bird Rock Avenue and the Esplanade, Mt Martha (“Opposition to aged care centre” The News 20/3/18). Ms Pollard said the proposed nursing home had been planned over the past two years. “It should be noted that the authority governing nursing home bed licences has specifically identified Mornington and Mt Martha as the area within Victoria in most need of increased aged care beds,” she said. “The proposed nursing home will be a community facility that will potentially be in place for many years to come servicing the local Mt Martha
and Mornington population.” Ms Pollard said the nursing home would cover 1.25 hectares of the 3.19 hectares site “with no existing vegetation or animals to be effected”. “The proposed access will be situated on the existing fire break that runs along the relevant boundary minimising removal of vegetation,” she said. Ms Pollard said that only “a portion” of the nursing home would be double-storey and it would have a 10-metre setback from houses in Bird Rock Avenue, not the required two metres; “More importantly, the existing owner (below) of the property and her beloved miniature horse Taffy will still be seen exercising around the local streets of Mt Martha.” Details of the subdivision and development applications are available on Mornington Peninsula Shire’s website.
AN artist’s impression of the liquid hydrogento-gas plant planned at Hastings. The state and federal governments have agreed to put $100 million towards a fouryear pilot program extracting hydrogen from brown coal at the Loy Yang power station in the Latrobe Valley. The gas will be shipped from Hastings to Japan while the unwanted CO2 emissions are stored underground in the Latrobe Valley.
Doubts over hydrogen plan Continued from Page 1 A brochure distributed at the same time as the announcement by the prime minister said CCS (carbon capture and storage) would not be part of the pilot program “due to the low volumes of CO2 involved, equivalent to the annual emissions of about 20 cars”. “As such, [Mornington Peninsula Shire] council would have very good reason to ensure that its policy commitment to carbon neutrality is not breached and council ought to be very concerned that this project does not add to the carbon footprint within the shire,” Cr Fraser said. Karri Giles of Westernport and Peninsula Protection Council said the hydrogen proposal was “unwelcome”. “Four industrial processes, two journeys and the wrecking of Western Port by dredging and marine pests makes this hydrogen power source for Japan definitely not green or clean,” she said. “It must be one of the least efficient
power sources ever dreamt up, and certainly one of the most expensive. [Kawasaki in 2017] told us they were looking for a partnership with the Victorian government and, sure enough, this week our governments have announced a spend of $100 million on the trial alone.” Hastings Liberal MP Neale Burgess last year accused the state government of signing a “secret deal” with Kawasaki Heavy Industries that could lead to “long coal trains or a coal slurry pipe bringing huge amounts of coal to Hastings, building of a huge coal gasification plant at Hastings and the produced hydrogen being shipped through Western Port” (“Secret deal for toxic plan – MP” The News 17/1/17) Mr Burgess said he had been turned away from a meeting between the Port of Hastings Development Authority and Kawasaki executives. Afterwards, in an email, the authority’s chief financial officer Mark
O’Donnell said he had been advised “that if a member for parliament is seeking any information in relation to the Port of Hastings Development Authority they should direct their inquiry to the Minister for Ports [Luke Donnellan]”. Mr Burgess’s strong stance last year against the plant being located anywhere in Western Port contrasted with that of his federal Liberal colleague, Flinders MP Greg Hunt, who only ruled out “reindustrialisation” at Crib Point. Mr Hunt said in January 2017 that he was “utterly opposed” to Western Port being used as a coal port “and I have made it clear that Crib Point should not be reindustrialised for hydrogen or bitumen”. Mr Hunt said he knew of discussions between the state and Kawasaki but “as far as I am aware, at this stage no decisions have been made as to the port they will use”.
LEVEL CROSSING REMOVAL WORKS
FROM 4 MAY – 18 JUNE Upcoming changes to the Frankston Line
Works will continue to remove the level crossing at Skye/Overton Road on the Frankston line and build the new Frankston Station and will affect the way you travel. The sooner we get this done, the sooner you’ll be on your way.
Buses will replace trains
Frankston Station closure
• On the Frankston line between Carrum and Frankston from first service on Friday 4 May until last service on Sunday 27 May
• On the Stony Point line between Carrum and Stony Point from first service Friday 4 May until last service on Sunday 27 May
• Between Kananook and Frankston from first service on Monday 28 May until last service on Sunday 17 June.
• Between Leawarra and Kananook from first service on Monday 28 May until last service on Sunday 17 June.
• To allow for parts of the current station to be demolished, the southbound lane of Young Street, Frankston will be closed from Friday 27 April until Monday 25 June. • From 22 April station facilities will begin to relocate to the Fletcher Road carpark to prepare for major station works
to begin. Frankston station will close from first service Friday 4 May until last service Sunday 17 June. • A temporary station will be in operation in the Fletcher Road carpark to service replacement buses before, during and after this period.
Please plan ahead and allow and extra time for your journey.
Local traders will be open for business during this time, so please support businesses in the area.
contact@levelcrossings.vic.gov.au 1800 105 105 levelcrossings.vic.gov.au
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Mornington News
17 April 2018
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