Experts say places of worship overlooked in planning for new suburbs

For many communities moving to Melbourne's booming outer fringes, a place to worship is crucial.

But experts say a lack of proper planning is leading to conflict between religious communities, environmentalists and other residents when it comes to building new churches, mosques and temples in the city's growth corridors.

In the city's outer south-east, an application right across the road from the urban growth boundary is the latest to cause tensions.

The Bethel New Life Christian Fellowship has submitted plans for a $3.5 million development, including a double-storey church for up to 400 patrons and 120 car parking spaces, on Cranbourne-Frankston Road in Cranbourne South, opposite a bustling residential development.

Pastor Nithun Britto said the congregation has outgrown its space in an industrial part of Dandenong, where it conducts Sunday services for up to 300 people in Tamil and 100 people in English.

He said they spent two years looking for an appropriate site for a new church within the booming Clyde-Cranbourne South area, which up to 90 per cent of the congregation calls home.

But they couldn't find anything big enough for a growing church, within their price range and inside the urban growth boundary.

"A community thrives when people can connect and grow together and not be in isolation, and this is one thing that is being overlooked," Pastor Britto said.

"They're looking at shops, they're looking at schools, all very vital, but I feel a community gathering place, places of worship, is a key foundation."

After they bought the $1.8 million site, the church group spent three years putting together a planning application they hope will tick all the boxes, including reducing the original footprint and maintaining many of the trees.

"We're doing our level best to try and blend with what already exists there rather than just make a random thing that just pops up there," Pastor Britto said.

The City of Casey will now consider the application.

Some locals object to application

Anthony Tassone, from the Casey Residents and Ratepayers Association, lodged an objection to the application due to its location in a green wedge zone.

"People do need a place to worship and observe their faith, we are a diverse community here in the City of Casey and proudly so," he said.

"But what we need to do is better plan for our growing community and not allow these types of developments to be plonked in green wedge that are not suitable here and completely inconsistent with the purpose of what green wedge stands for."

Robert Deane has lived nearby for more than 40 years, and said the application threatened what the community loved about the area.

"We're a green wedge and this development is not in keeping with the green wedge, it's more an urban style place and this is what we're losing out on," he said.

He pointed to a big housing development on the opposite side of the urban growth boundary running along Cranbourne-Frankston Road.

"It's like the western front — on one side you've got no-man's-land and then you've got urban development encroaching on the green wedge," he said.

Jenny Dalgleish from the Western Port Green Wedge Protection Group said maintaining the boundary was critical.

"The reason it was put in place was for agriculture, conservation, outdoor recreation and we need to support the biodiversity in this area," she said.

"We have so many endangered species in this area, not just the southern brown bandicoot but we've got koalas, wedge-tailed eagles, powerful owls, and we need to protect them for generations to come."

She said applications for places of worship in green wedge areas were becoming more frequent, and more needed to be done to allow people to practice their faith inside the urban growth boundary.

"It is a big issue because they're just popping up everywhere and a lot of them are just operating quietly but a lot of them are big proposals and there's a lot to come," she said.

She pointed to a proposed $250 million development of a Hindu temple in Cranbourne South, which was withdrawn last year, citing a redesign.

Experts call for better planning, more investment

Professor Andrew Butt, from RMIT's Centre for Urban Research, said green wedge spaces could be appropriate for places of worship, with the right planning controls.

"The real issue to me is whether we're providing enough spaces in the greenfield growth areas themselves to house the uses we expect our community to have, religious uses being one of them," he said.

"These kinds of community facilities are essential to new neighbourhoods, new community building."

He said governments needed to better consider all types of community spaces — including places of worship and scout halls — in suburb planning.

"At the moment, we've got such an emphasis on housing provision and so little thought to what quality social infrastructure looks like in our neighbourhoods, particularly our greenfields outer suburban area," he said.

Professor Butt also said governments must invest more in other infrastructure, to lead the way.

"There's got to be a willingness for government to step up and make the starting investments that often drive the other viable community infrastructure surrounding them, whether that's transport, government services, government schools, and not relying on those things to be built at some time in the future," he said.

Places of worship a big issue for outer councils

Across Melbourne's growth areas, councils are grappling with a lack of space for places of worship.

In Melbourne's outer north, councillors at the City of Whittlesea voted to reject an application for a yoga and meditation studio on Grants Road in Woodstock last October.

Council officers found the "proposed use of the land for a Place of Worship represents a departure from the existing agricultural and rural residential character of the Woodstock and Eden Park area".

Councillor Jarrod Lappin told the meeting there had been a lot of community input into the decision, and appreciated those who had been respectful.

"There is considerable need for accessible sites that can be used as places of worship," he said.

"It's clear this site is not appropriate, however I would like to recognise the community need for these spaces and ask that the CEO consider how we may proceed with more clarity for preferred locations for places of worship in the City of Whittlesea, to ensure the diverse needs of the community are met and community spaces are delivered in accessible locations."

In Kilmore, north of Melbourne, a heritage-listed church is being converted into a mosque.

Victoria's biggest mosque opened in the fast-growing area of Tarneit, in Melbourne's outer south-west, in 2022.

A spokesperson for the state government did not answer questions on whether enough was being done to ensure planning for places of worship in new suburbs.

They said the application in Cranbourne South was a matter for the City of Casey.