The historic Fort Queenscliff site is earmarked to the sold off under a ADF review of asset sales.
The Australian Defence Force will cut ties with Fort Queenscliff after more than 160 years is a move described as a disgraceful betrayal of the community.
The 1860s fort is among five ADF-owned or leased sites in Geelong to be divested amid a nearly $2bn asset sell-off, Defence Minister and Corio MP Richard Marles has revealed.
The historic fort overlooking the shipping lanes at Port Phillip Heads was built following the Crimean War and its claimed officers at the Fort ordered Australia’s first artillery shots of the First and Second World Wars, from a gun at Fort Nepean.
Defence will also sell off the golf course portion of Swan Island, a special forces training facility off Queenscliff, the Newland Barracks in Myers St, Geelong, along with an Air Force Cadets building at Newtown and end its lease on a Western Beach building that houses Geelong Training Ship Barwon.
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Defence personnel, including an Army Reserve unit Newland Barracks would be co-located at a proposed multi-user depot in Geelong, while cadet units could lease community venues.
The multi-user depot is expected be located in North Geelong or North Shore, but the process could take a couple of years.
The Geelong properties are among 68 identified for divestment, including Victoria Barracks and RAAF Williams air bases at Laverton and Point Cook, worth about $2bn combined.
The proceeds from the sell-offs will be retained by the Defence portfolio and be reinvested in National Defence Strategy priorities, including continuing to upgrade and strengthen northern bases.
Minister for Defence, Richard Marles at a press conference at Parliament House in Canberra to announce Defence asset sales. Picture: NewsWire / Martin Ollman
Deputy Prime Minister and defence minister Richard Marles said the ADF must have a Defence estate that meets its operational and capability needs.
“For many years this has not been the case, with many Defence sites vacant, decaying, under-utilised and costing millions of dollars to maintain,” Mr Marles said.
Geelong-based Senator Sarah Henderson said selling the fort was a “disgraceful betrayal of our community which shows contempt for the one of Australia’s most significant historic defence sites”.
“Richard Marles has demonstrated he could not care less about the importance of Fort Queenscliff to our region and our nation,” Ms Henderson said.
“For many years, I have fought Labor’s underhanded attempts to sell off the fort. Despite years of warnings, advocacy and community opposition, Mr Marles has chosen to resurrect a discredited proposal which treats a nationally significant defence asset as little more than surplus real estate.”
Defence will sell off central Geelong’s Newland Barracks.
The ADF will cut it’s lease on the TS Barwon facility at Western Beach, Geelong, under a ADF review of asset sales.
The properties are likely to earn Defence tens of millions of dollars in much-needed revenue, with the barracks site in central Geelong likely to be the most straightforward development site, given part of the site already has Activity Centre zoning.
The neighbouring old Geelong Gaol netted $1.5m for City of Greater Geelong in 2018, but while Newland Barracks is of similar land size, it has far more developable space.
Newland Barracks is the Alpha Company headquarters of the 8th/7th Battalion, Royal Victorian Regiment, that was a specialist bush warfare battalion of the Australian Army that helped capture Tobruk in World War II, as well as landing at Anzac Cove, the Somme, Bullecourt and Ypres in World War I.
Fort Queenscliff is on the Commonwealth Heritage List, including man of the buildings, the black lighthouse, gun emplacements, perimeter walls, the Keep, and Quartermasters store.
The historic Fort Queenscliff site is earmarked to the sold off under a ADF review of asset sales.
The ADF has announced it will sell off the Air Force Cadets building in Newtown as part of a review of defence assets.
While the workforce of less than 50 at the Fort will be relocated to Geelong or Melbourne, options will be explored with future owners to manage the heritage obligations and to allow the museum to continue to operate.
The Queenscliff properties offered opportunities to add to the upgraded ferry terminal and leverage the Bellarine Peninsula’s renowned golf courses.
Gartland Geelong director Michael De Stefano said the substantial array of heritage-listed fort buildings made it difficult as a development site.
“Whether it becomes a private museum or they do something where there’s restaurants and perhaps accommodation, they could create a real precinct that respects the military side of things but is really beneficial to the area,” he said.
Mr De Stefano said the Geelong barracks site near the hospital precinct made it an ideal mixed use site, potentially Barwon Health future use retaining the heritage-listed drill hall.
But the cadets hall in Newtown had the best prospects, he said.
“I could certainly imagine there would be some continuing use as a warehouse in a quirky location.
“The other option would be a warehouse conversion that overlooks the oval (at Elderslie Reserve). I think that site would be a little cracker.”
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