Planning ahead

The 57th annual general meeting (AGM) of the Parkville Association was held on May 13 at Naughtons. We are very fortunate to have its owner Ryan Moses as a member and use the venue on a Monday when it is closed to the public.

Our guest speakers were Deputy Lord Mayor Nick Reece, and Claire Johnson and Matt Venderpeet from Rail Projects Victoria. We also had a chat with Sgt Nick Parissis from Victoria Police about community policing matters.

Rob Krelle retired from the committee after more than 10 years including two as president, as did Ryan Moses (fair enough given two pubs and two kids taking a little time in his life), who will continue to assist with social matters.

We welcomed two new committee members being Michael Aleisi, a communications expert from West Parkville and Jared Dyson, Deputy Dean of Trinity College and a local resident. 

Nick Reece gave an excellent overview of his role and the City of Melbourne’s plans for this year. He emphasised the importance of the suburbs of Melbourne and fellow councillor Davydd Griffiths gave an update on some safety matters. Nick will become the Lord Mayor in June and we wish him luck in the 2024 Mayoral election.

With nearly 60 of our 180 members present, the meeting was a great success and now having two members from the colleges across Royal Parade we are truly representative of the whole of Parkville. 

On the subject of the University, we have entered into a collaboration with Trinity College where their students will assist gardening in the nature strip reservations initially in South Parkville.

Pictured above are (left to right) senior student Peter Lowe, myself, Dean of Trinity Residential College Leonie Jongenelis, student coordinator Asha Goddard and Deputy Dean and Parkville Association committee member Jared Dyson. When you see the team at work say “hi” as students have always been an integral part of Parkville! 

On the subject of safety, I met with senior representatives of the e-scooter companies recently to discuss safety together with a couple of other residents’ association leaders.

We all have concerns about the safety on our roads and pavements so as soon as the arrangements are formalised, we need to have a major input with the council to the tender document. This is critical as with geo-fencing pavements can be protected and both the use and parking of the scooters controlled.

I am also working to get the road rules in front of as many students as possible to ensure our local road rules are followed. We tend to forget overseas students often grow up in a totally different environment and need help understanding our road rules. Given we have two new hook turn junctions coming up on Grattan St, we may also need help!

Finally, you may have noticed measuring strips on the roads in South Parkville. They were there to measure traffic before and will be there after Grattan St reopens. Following that there will be a meeting with South Parkville residents regarding “rat running” and speeding.

Enjoy June and hopefully the sunny weather continues! •