by Cam Lucadou-Wells<\/p>\n
Melbourne Racing Club\u2019s plans for keeping Sandown racecourse open for racing are unchanged, despite the sudden departure of chair John Kanga.<\/p>\n
Over several years, MRC had sought to rezone the 112-hectare racecourse, releasing a proposal for a 7500-dwelling, 16,000-resident housing estate.<\/p>\n
However in an election coup last year, Kanga and a group opposed to a Sandown selloff wrested control of the MRC board and upended the plans.<\/p>\n
This month, Kanga announced his immediate resignation after a \u201cseries of public attacks directed at me personally\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhile I completely reject the nature and accuracy of those attacks, I do not want them to distract from the Club, its members, or the excitement of the Caulfield Cup Carnival,\u201d he stated.<\/p>\n
In a statement last week, MRC backed Sandown\u2019s \u201cvital role in Victorian racing\u201d with a \u201chigh-quality\u201d surface and \u201cimportant training and trial facility\u201d.<\/p>\n
The club also intends to potentially develop \u201cexcess land\u201d at the venue.<\/p>\n
Any future development would \u201ccomplement and support the continuation of racing\u201d at Sandown, the MRC stated.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Club\u2019s broader strategy focuses on bringing Sandown back to life \u2014 improving the racing and racegoer experience, unlocking untapped non-race-day revenue, and engaging with local communities and younger audiences to grow the sport\u2019s appeal.\u201d<\/p>\n
In December, a State-appointed Sandown Racecourse Advisory Committee (SRAC) found the housing-estate plan was \u201cwell founded and strategically justified\u201d \u2013 especially with targets of 51,000 new homes in Greater Dandenong by 2050.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Sandown site presents a significant redevelopment opportunity with the potential to make a substantial contribution to required housing supply in the City of Greater Dandenong and the southeast region of Melbourne more generally.\u201d<\/p>\n
The SRAC noted many \u201cpassionate\u201d submissions to retain horse and motor racing at the site.<\/p>\n
But the fate of those sports at the venue was a matter for the MRC, it stated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"by Cam Lucadou-Wells Melbourne Racing Club\u2019s plans for keeping Sandown racecourse open for racing are unchanged, despite the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":512870,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4107],"tags":[1071,79,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-512869","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-racing","8":"tag-racing","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115403096558291261","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/512869","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=512869"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/512869\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/512870"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=512869"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=512869"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=512869"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}