Middleborough Road grade separation noise levels

Hansard: 13 February 2007 ASSEMBLY

Mr CLARK (Box Hill) — I raise concerns about the very high levels of noise inflicted by the Middleborough Road grade separation project on nearby Box Hill and Blackburn residents. During the main construction period of several weeks noise continued 24 hours a day for days on end. Residents were unable to sleep or carry on any normal domestic functioning without disruption from intense and often painful noise.

It may well be reasonable for members of the community to accept some level of noise and other disruption in the public interest, but the level of distress inflicted on a number of residents by this project has exposed the disregard of the current government and its bureaucracy for the wellbeing of individual citizens and also highlights serious flaws in the application of the law to public projects.

This project was promised by the government in 2002 but then delayed for so long that in the end the government and VicRoads rushed to cut corners on the project design and planning in order to get it built quickly. The Environment Protection Act sets no clear standards about noise from public projects, thereby leaving a great deal to the discretion of the Environment Protection Authority. The EPA made noises about getting the project to comply with an approved noise abatement plan, but when it came to the crunch failed to take any effective action to keep noise within reasonable limits.

VicRoads is now talking about using 24/7 construction on similar future projects. For the sake of residents in suburbs across Melbourne, we need to establish clear principles about what levels of noise are and are not acceptable from public projects, and we need changes to the legal regime and EPA practices to make sure citizens have effective protection against government abuse of power.