The 108-year-old hall at Doreen has been demolished.
The disused weatherboard building was levelled last week to make way for roadworks and the development of the Doreen Recreation Reserve.
Whittlesea mayor Ricky Kirkham said the demolition would allow for a set of traffic lights to be installed at the notorious Bridge Inn and Yan Yean roads intersection, and for the future duplication of Yan Yean Road.
Last year, Star Weekly reported that a portion of the Bridge Inn Road reserve lay within the area earmarked for Doreen’s recreation reserve and, along with the Doreen hall, was standing in the way of plans to have Yan Yean Road declared a state road between Kurrak and Bridge Inn roads.
Cr Kirkham said the demolition of the Doreen hall was made public when plans were being drawn up for the recreation reserve last year.
“Parts of the structure will be salvaged and stored to be used as part of a commemorative piece at the site to honour the history of the reserve and the community-built hall,” Cr Kirkham said.
But not everyone is happy with the timing of the demolition. Third-generation Doreen resident Julie Sutherland said the council did not tell locals when the hall would be demolished.
She said she was on the hall committee for a number of years and is disappointed the council did not adequately maintain the building nor tell the area’s older residents exactly when it was due to be taken down.
She said they would have liked to take photos and commemorate the event.
“My father’s cousin used to live across the road from us. She’s 97 now. She’s been here all her married life, about 70 years,” Ms Sutherland said. “I dread anyone having to tell her the hall’s gone. Because it was a landmark.”
Ms Sutherland said the hall was the centre of community life when the area was a sparsely populated farming district. Her forbears, as well as her husband’s relatives, settled in Doreen in the 1860s. The same property is still in the family.
Ms Sutherland said her grandparents and parents went to weekly dances at the hall.
“Mum still talks about it. That’s all they had back then.”
