Talbot Futures

Talbot Futures Project

The Talbot Futures project includes two components – a town structure plan including a heritage review (overseen by Council) and investigations into providing a reticulated sewerage scheme for Talbot (overseen by Central Highlands Water).

The recently adopted Talbot Structure Plan will provide direction around population growth, future housing demand and areas for infill and greenfield development for Talbot upon implementing a reticulated sewerage scheme for the township.

The Sewerage Scheme Business Case has been endorsed, so we can now advocate for funding from both state and federal government to obtain the funding required for delivery of affordable sewerage provision.

More about Talbot Futures

Integrated planning for Talbot to thrive continues to be a priority for Council.

The planning work - referred to as the Talbot Futures Project - begun in September 2022, with consultant teams commencing work to deliver two key elements of the project.

The goal of the overall project is to establish an overall vision for the future of Talbot that protects the township’s key heritage and character attributes while allowing for a sustainable level of growth and change.

Developing an updated sewerage scheme design is key to enabling this growth and addressing the environmental issues created by unsewered wastewater management.

The two core components of the project are a town structure plan overseen by Council and an updated and fully costed sewerage scheme plan overseen by Central Highlands Water.

The engineering firm Jacobs has been contracted to undertake the technical and costing assessments for the sewerage scheme and this work has already commenced.

Council has recently appointed Hansen Partnership to lead the structure planning side of the project, in association with SGS Economics and Hello City engagement specialists.

Both contracts were awarded following a public tender process.

In September 2021, the Victorian Government (Living Regions Living Suburbs Fund) announced $630,000 that has enabled the commencement of the Structure Plan and Business Case for the project. Council is also contributing $60,000 towards this work.

The project is listed in Council’s Priority Projects Plan for advocacy to Government.

Talbot Heritage Review Stage One

The Talbot Heritage Review (Stage One):

  • is early implementation of the Talbot Futures Structure Plan
  • focuses on the areas within the existing HO208
  • involves desktop research, fieldwork, and a community information session
  • is foundation research that will confirm the ‘historic core’ of Talbot and assist to identify areas where new development should be supported, minimised, or avoided
  • The project is running from January 2024 to June 2024

Talbot is a much-loved historic town, and we know its local community is passionate about its heritage and character.

Over the past few years, we’ve been working with local residents to develop the Talbot Future Structure Plan (TFSP) which will provide a way to carefully manage change as the town grows. This work is almost complete and we thank the local community for their input - your thoughts and help have been so important.

Talbot’s heritage is crucial to its identity, as well as its social, environmental and economic wellbeing. Council plays a pivotal role protecting the heritage left to us by generations past. This is often done through the heritage overlay control in the Central Goldfields Planning Scheme.

Currently, local planning scheme controls for Talbot mainly consist of a single, ‘blanket’ listing (Heritage Overlay called HO208), that are based on a study done in 1988. Talbot also has several individual places that have been protected in the Victorian Heritage Register (VHR) – as they are places of State Significance. These will not be affected by the current work.

To make sure that Talbot’s heritage is protected during likely change, the local heritage control for Talbot (Heritage Overlay called HO208) needs to be reviewed so that it is clearer, stronger and more targeted. While this project will not result in immediate changes to the Central Goldfields Planning Scheme, it also is the first of two stages of heritage work to do this.

map with heritage overlay highlighted

Technical Information about Zones and Overlays

Notethe information below provides a brief introduction to some zones and overlays. The summaries do not provide commentary on all planning permit requirements, such as those associated with the construction of buildings or the carrying out of works. Please refer to the Central Goldfields Planning Scheme for full information.