The final boss for Australia’s biggest NIMBYs: WAYNE FLOWER went to The Block’s new neighbourhood – and this country town that’s home to some of the nation’s top judges won’t go down without a fight

Construction on the latest site that will house The Block is pushing ahead at speed despite the gripes of a few dusty and well-to-do residents. 

It’s a story as old as the hills by now. 

Producers of The Block know all too well residents living in the locations they choose to run the show are going to complain. 

This time it’s in Daylesford – a town in the foothills of the Great Dividing Range of Victoria known for its natural mineral springs. 

It is also the home of some of Australia’s wealthiest, smartest and professional minds. 

Some of whom worked hard to stop The Block ‘tainting’ their community from the moment they caught wind it was heading their way. 

It was always going to be a tough ask stopping The Block juggernaut. 

Previous shows have hardly run in locations where residents are short of intelligence, know-how or a buck. 

Last season’s development went ahead on Phillip Island and before that it was in leafy Hampton. 

Residents there all had issues with The Block too. Those issues remain largely the same wherever the production drops. 

On Thursday, excavators were seen hard at it preparing the land where The Block’s contestants will work their magic on five homes. 

Situated on 1 Raglan Street – just around the corner from the main township – it is surrounded on two sides by old homes. 

In those homes live at least some residents who have been there for the past 40 years.

‘You can’t stop progress,’ an elderly woman living in the home closest to the construction site tells me. 

But that didn’t stop a group of Daylesford residents attempting to do just that. 

When the planning permit lobbed at Hepburn Shire Council on October 13 last year, it was accompanied with a dozen objections. 

With a population of more than 10,000, the council was right to believe it was on safe ground with ticking the development off. 

‘One would hope the history, culture and charm of Daylesford is NOT about to be monopolised and capitalised on by a commercial TV reality show for the benefit of a few,’ one objector wrote. 

‘Is this type of development at the entry to iconic Daylesford there to exploit or contribute to the historical town and precinct?

‘The face of Daylesford will be blurred by this city-centric pseudo attempt at a “farm building” style – five housing estate replicas typically without architectural consideration of the site, surround and climate.’

While the objections were but a handful, they were packed with venom. 

‘The overarching reason that this development should not proceed in its current state is character. The last inhabitants of that land were sheep,’ another resident stated. 

‘The architect is from Sydney and has little understanding of our little town in the highlands – swimming pools on every block? 

‘That joke aside, the architect has created one rambling urban dwelling and simply twisted this way, and that, on each block.

‘Speaking of The Block, this would not only allow a developer to determine our entrance to town with one boring architect, with these houses placed boundary to boundary, then a series of untrained media-hungry REALITY TV random people, are to execute the builds. It is ludicrous in the extreme. It defies belief.’

One of the main objectors, architect David Moore, claimed the site was of significant importance to First Nations people. 

‘To begin we must acknowledge Aboriginal possession especially as the land is crossed by a watercourse and the proposed activity is a high impact,’ he wrote. 

The architect’s objection went on to give the council a detailed lecture on urban design. 

Among a swag of issues was a submission the development would hide the existence of the historic mining tunnel, the Defiance Tunnel.

Mr Moore claimed the site has potential to contain archaeological features, deposits or artefacts that relate to the use of the property for 1860s gold mining. 

When the development was approved, Mr Moore and some other objectors took the matter to the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal in an effort to have it overturned. 

For a moment it appeared as though The Block had finally met its match. 

The residents had already run VCAT objection cases against numerous phases of the Middleton Field development, where The Block was to reside.

In September last year, developers Hygge Property and architect Julian Brenchley – the official architect of the TV series since 2003 – told The Age that The Block had a policy of walking away from sites that became embroiled in tribunal disputes.

Mr Moore and his allies enjoyed some success in VCAT, which set aside Hepburn Shire Council’s permit approval on what amounted to be a technicality.

The tribunal ruled it was the Victorian state planning minister who had the authority to grant the permit, not the council. 

The objectors had only delayed the inevitable. 

With both the minister and the local council behind the wider development, VCAT cleared the way in July for construction on the site to begin. 

Hepburn Mayor Brian Hood welcomed the decision. 

‘Daylesford will provide a picturesque backdrop for the filming of The Block, and it is anticipated that the production will generate a boost for the local economy,’ he said at the time. 

‘We would strongly encourage producers, contestants and the support crew to shop and eat local to ensure economic benefits flow back into our community.’

Cr Hood said the development was only approved with a significant number of conditions, including the retention and protection of all Avenue of Honour trees, which line the site.

‘This decision was appealed at VCAT by residents, after which the Minister for Planning issued a permit allowing the development,’ he said. 

‘The Minister’s permit includes a number of requirements around landscaping, construction, stormwater and environmentally sustainable design.’

On Raglan Street, across the road from the now dusty and noisy construction site, residents carry on life with the hope the development won’t change theirs for the worse. 

‘If it ends up detracting from the ambience of this end of Raglan Street, it won’t be good. You’re standing in what is a historical precinct that is connected to the tourist railway,’ one resident tells me. 

‘A brand-new development over there with modern-looking houses is probably going to be in stark contrast with what’s on [the opposite] side of the street.’

The site is also located a stone’s throw from the Daylesford Sunday Market, which in itself is known to cause traffic chaos in the area when it’s held. 

‘The big problem with the whole thing comes to a head every Sunday because of the Sunday market. That paddock is full of cars, both sides of the road are chock-a-block full of cars, traffic is slowed to a crawl, trying to get your car out backwards on a Sunday is a hazardous experience because of the congestion in traffic,’ another homeowner says.

‘Now that’s not going to make it better over there especially if that driveway over there turns into a road with a streetlight and an intersection and a stop sign. So if you factor all of that in, there will be an effect on this part of town particularly on a Sunday.’

With construction still in its early days, the site is expected to soon attract lines of trucks along the Honour Avenue strip. 

As in other years, traffic controllers are likely to be placed full time at the site, bringing traffic to a halt in both directions for large proportions of the day. 

At present, residents have noted construction on the site has continued to run on a Saturday up until about midday, but fear it will become a seven-day-a-week operation as construction gears up. 

‘They do have certain rostered days off during the week when there’s no noise coming from over there,’ a resident says. 

Producers are yet to make themselves known to residents living around the construction site. 

In previous years, The Block producers have been known to offer huge dollars to nearby residents to take control of their properties to use as operations headquarters. 

While the surrounding homes of this year’s site are packed with full-time residents, I also observed many tell-tale signs of homes being used as Airbnb rentals, which could act as The Block offices. 

With dust kicking up from the construction site and blanketing homes across the road, residents can do little more than hope the work is finished promptly. 

Work on The Block is traditionally done at lightning speed, with teams of construction workers helping the contestants complete the job.  

‘I’ve just basically ignored them and sort of think, “Live and let live” because you can’t stop it. The state government pulled the rug out from under the council and said, “Yes, we’re all in favour of this development. We want more development, we want more houses,”‘ a resident tells me. 

It is an opinion shared by many business owners along the main drag, which has lived and died off tourism dollars for decades. 

‘These people are sooks,’ one business owner explains. ‘We can’t live off tourism here forever. The place needs to grow because we can’t [just] rely on tourism.’

Across the road from the construction site, a café worker tells me the development has divided the community. 

‘I feel like people are maybe pushing it aside because they were unsure whether it was still going ahead, but I think the views are pretty mixed,’ the worker says. 

‘We’re all unsure what it’s going to do for locals.’ 

When I visit, the café is already packed with diners, seemingly doing well off the local trade without any assistance from blow-ins off The Block construction site, which has been known to run its own McCafé in previous years. 

‘They’ve got Maccas mate. They won’t need us. Although our coffee is better than Maccas,’ the worker laughs.

Channel Nine declined to comment.