Thank you to everyone who participated in our consultation on the Suburban Rail Loop: Draft Precinct Visions for Cheltenham.

SRL East from Cheltenham to Box Hill will connect major employment, health, education and retail destinations in Melbourne’s east and southeast. The new underground station at Cheltenham will be the southern gateway to the SRL network, providing faster and more convenient public transport to key destinations across Melbourne’s middle suburbs.

To inform our advocacy and submission to the Suburban Rail Loop Authority (SRLA), we undertook a 7-week engagement program between 21 December 2023 and 11 February 2024.

More than 220 community members provided survey feedback.

Participants told us that:

• The project is not needed – State Government have not built a sufficient case to justify the benefits that the SRL will bring.
• The negative impact on amenity will include overdevelopment, density increase, traffic congestion and loss of open space.
• The project will cost too much money and other State-provided services will be impacted.
• The highest priority was for better connections followed by enriching community.
• Achieving seamless movement and connectivity across the precinct needs to focus on promoting sustainable transport and ensuring the precinct is functional.

What we’re doing:

Our community engagement program aimed to raise awareness among the Bayside community of the SRL East project as a whole and highlight the start of the precinct planning phase of the project.

Community feedback has informed our submission to the SRLA and will enable Council to best represent the views of the Bayside community in its advocacy.

Find out more: Community Engagement Summary Report

Next steps

Bayside’s submission to the Suburban Rail Loop draft Precinct Vision for Cheltenham, and a report on community feedback, will be considered by Council for endorsement at its 19 March Council meeting.

You can read the proposed submission and the community engagement summary report in the meeting agenda.

Council meeting: Tuesday 19 March 2024, 6.30pm

• Read the agenda
• Ask a question
• Request to be heard
• Watch the meeting