Mambourin, a planned community in Melbourne's west, raises concerns about its isolation and lack of development despite being a popular destination for new residents.
Melbourne’s west is Australia’s fastest-growing region. In a series, The Age examines what makes the west the place to be and what’s holding it back.Built on fallow farmland 40 kilometres south-west of Melbourne, Mambourin was designed to be a blueprint for compact, walkable suburbs on the urban fringe. But four years after the first homes began to rise from the red volcanic earth, fears are growing that the emerging community has been planted on the edge of the city and forgotten.
Mambourin is situated almost halfway between central Melbourne and Geelong, on the absolute perimeter of the urban growth boundary. To the west lies stubbly farmland, and a corridor of land reserved for a second western ring road that will be built one day. To the east, the city skyline is visible from the suburb’s highest vantage point, shimmering on the horizon like a distant mirage. From the front doorstep of Haylee Antonio’s newly built home, a fragment of the vast grassy plain that Mambourin is being built on can be seen, though it will soon be cleared for new housing. Antonio and her partner Elijah Teu bought a house and land package there in March, and moved into their new home in December.Antonio, a social worker, and Teu, who works in construction, emigrated from New Zealand in January last year. Priced out of Auckland’s property market, they saw an opportunity to buy in Melbourne’s outer west and pounced. “I just didn’t want to waste time. I’ve seen so many Kiwis come here, live the high life and then move back to New Zealand with nothing. And I wanted to switch the books for us,” she says. The couple paid $550,000 for a three-bedroom, two-garage house just five minutes’ walk from Mambourin Marketplace, a shopping centre scheduled to open in 2025
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