Club sets course for excitement

By Melissa Meehan
PAKENHAM’S racecourse is set to go on the market mid-year and the Pakenham Racing Club is excited about the future.
The 27-hectare property is currently being rezoned and is expected to be put on the market in the middle of the year, and snapped up as soon as possible.
Racing club CEO Michael Hodge told the Pakenham Business Group at its quarterly general meeting that the sale of the land would fund the new world-class racecourse development at Nar Nar Goon/Tynong.
“The recommendations from the Priority Development Project Planning Process are that Henry Road is to be extended through the middle of the racecourse which will split the site into two precincts,” Mr Hodge said.
“The south precinct, near the railway line would see the development of a retail component with higher density housing and there would be more diverse housing, maybe in the form of a retirement village on the north of Henry Road.”
He said there were grand plans in the works for the future of the current Racecourse Road site, including a suggestion to build a fly-over to Webster Way.
“The focus of development will be around the railway station … really open up the site for the Pakenham township,” he said.
He said the move to Nar Nar Goon/Tynong was not about the next five years, but the decades beyond that – to support the racing industry.
The new site could see night racing brought to the area and become one of the biggest training facilities in the southern hemisphere.
“There was no long-term future at the current site, which was confirmed by the 2008 Racing Industry Plan,” Mr Hodge said.
“So we will remain at our current site on Racecourse Road, Pakenham, for four years and start at the new racecourse in 2013.”
He said the club had little decision but to move to the $10 million Nar Nar Goon/Tynong property as funding would have been stopped if they had stayed in town.
“Thankfully we received approval to relocate to the 600-acre site at Nar Nar Goon/Tynong and we will continue to receive funding over the next four years,” he said.