By Tanya Steele
The Lilydale Road streetscape project in Healesville has received overwhelmingly negative responses from the community online, with a survey now opened looking for feedback into the project.
Yarra Ranges Council opened an engagement survey on 20 February, stating with the upgrade now in place, it wants feedback to see how the space is working for users and if there are any enhancements needed.
John Anwin, secretary of the Healesville Action Group, believes the road upgrade could have been done much better.
“The biggest problem that we see and what people are complaining about is difficulty getting in and out of the parking bays that are too small, too short,” Mr Anwin said.
The Healesville Action Group has been receiving mostly negative comments on the matter on their Facebook page and has encouraged residents to utilise the feedback page on the Yarra Ranges Council website.
The streetscape project was launched in 2019 with the intent to improve safety, convenience and access along the road and general area.
“I think nobody would argue that the old Lilydale Road was pretty rough. It had no curb channel, no footpath,” Mr Anwin said.
McKenzie’s Tourist Services bus depot is located in the developed area and general manager Brad Sanders has a similar viewpoint.
“The aesthetics of the road are much better with the cross points, footpaths and so on but the traffic movements are not as efficient as they could be,” he said.
So far, there has been a large volume of comments on the council feedback page with nearly 200 to date, most of which are not positive.
Residents have been posting feedback on the council website with comments such as:
“Unsafe turn out from parks and driveways, path too wide-road too narrow, angle parking, bottleneck at mar highway, one ped crossing more car parks,” Christine said.
Another resident commented, “Makes the road confusing and unsafe for all using the road, on foot and in vehicles, very congested car parks should be angled, it’s nasty.”
Liz posted, “As someone who uses the road daily it is a hazard, near accidents from cars backing into traffic and unable to see past cars that are parked.”
The area has seen more traffic congestion in the last few years due to increased visitors to the distillery and winery in the area.
The initial project evolved through many proposals and received funding from the federal government under the Roads to Recovery program.
The road was flagged for surface rehabilitation, increased parking spaces, wider pedestrian pathways, raised crossings and additional underground drainage.
“The original proposal was that they wanted to actually close off Lilydale road and turn that whole area into a tourist area, and that got the resounding thumbs down. So then it got modified in various forms until it ended up with what we’ve got now,” Mr Anwin said.
Residents can continue to leave comments on the Yarra Ranges Council website until March 26 via https://shaping.yarraranges.vic.gov.au/lilydale-rd-healesville-streetscape-improvements
Yarra Ranges Council was contacted for comment.
