A LARGE-SCALE redevelopment of Camperdown’s holiday park will go ahead despite some fears it could turn the crater-top precinct into a “country club”.
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Corangamite Shire councillors granted a permit for the expansion at their meeting on Tuesday, heralding the plans as a welcome opportunity to draw more visitors to the area.
The Lakes and Craters Holiday Park development will include the addition of a swimming pool, jumping pillow, six new cabins, a games room and new toilets.
The revamp will be the latest improvements to the park under current leasees Anthony Meechan and Jodie Jagoe.
The plans attracted support from councillors, however, the proposal has raised the ire of the Camperdown Botanic Gardens and Arboretum Trust, which feared more development would limit public access to the area and put the site’s heritage values at risk.
The caravan park is located within the arboretum on land located between twin crater lakes Gnotuk and Bullen Merri. Access to the botanic gardens is through the holiday park.
Mr Meechan said the impact of new buildings would be minimal and experts including an arborist had been used in developing the plans.
“We’ve taken great care in the design and planning of the development,” he said.
“We want to enhance the area, not detract from it.”
Mr Meechan said the improvements would have flow-on effects.
“If the amenity of the park is raised it will increase visitors to the botanic gardens and the arboretum,” he said.
“With greater patronage to the camping area comes economic benefits for the whole town.”
Mr Meechan said for every $1 spent in holiday parks, campers were likely to spend $1.38 in the town’s CBD.
Camperdown Botanic Gardens and Arboretum Trust’s Pam Jellie voiced the group’s opposition to the plans at the meeting.
“The proposal before you is a comprehensive development. It virtually perverts the site to a country club,” she said.
“It’s a critical reserve that belongs to everyone. We should all have access to that site.”
The trust believes the holiday park should be relocated to another site where it has room to grow, allowing the botanic gardens and arboretum to also be developed.
However, councillor Ruth Gstrein said the development struck the right balance.
“It’s about finding a balance of sympathetically developing the caravan park and protecting the botanic gardens and arboretum,” she said.
“I think what we have before us is a sympathetic development to enhance the caravan park.”
