Perth Voice Interactive

CARR STREET locals have formed an action group to fight a fire station planned for their residential area.

The empty site, formerly a factory that burned down in 2012, has neighbouring houses and apartments in all directions, and locals are worried about noise, traffic and health impacts.

The state government spent $8.7 million buying the site and last August emergency services minister Joe Francis announced plans for a $19m station.

Mr Francis said the new station would ease pressures on the existing one in East Perth as the city kept growing.

“The Perth city link, Elizabeth Quay and other projects will see the construction of more high-rise buildings in the CBD, and with higher density comes higher demands on the fire service,” Mr Francis said.

The new station is slated to have three vehicles and up to 12 firefighters per shift.

But the location has locals puzzled: The quadrant of Carr, Charles, Newcastle and Vincent Street is a traffic nightmare at peak hour and they reckon a fire truck would get horribly snagged in the commuter rush.

“Why a fast response service would even consider [this] location lacks foresight,” reads a flyer letterboxed by the action group.

There’s also worries about what “hazardous materials” could be stored on site, especially given the unsolved mystery of the Success fire station cancer cluster that cropped up between 2008 and 2014.

A FAQ issued by the department of fire and emergency services sought to assuage fears, telling locals studies found fire stations wouldn’t damage nearby property values and saying the swank building would “improve the aesthetics of the street scape” and be “iconic and not perceived as a standard fire station”.

The FAQ says the location was picked after they considered the lot size, the response times they’d get for nearby fires, population studies, “traffic congestion hot spots” and considering where it sits in relation to other stations.

However the department concedes that training on the grounds including car crash rescue drills and other outdoor exercises could sometimes extend to 10.30pm at night. The department also says they’ll only whack the lights and sirens on when absolutely necessary and that they generally don’t start blaring them when leaving the station.

We’ve asked the department to address questions about any hazardous material that could be stored on site and are awaiting a response.

Vincent city council is handling the community consultation but mayor John Carey says they have zero say over whether the station gets built, they can only pass on the consultation forms to the state government with the WA planning commission to make the final call.

by DAVID BELL