HISTORICAL
The Belgrave Reservoir was constructed on
the Monbulk Creek about 1893 to supply
water to Dandenong, and a storage basin was put in south of Wellington Road,
near the junction of Bergins and Police Roads.
Just
south of the basin a smaller "sedimentation dam", was commissioned in February 1914, to improve water
quality, fed from the main storage
reservoir by a 5" pipe. This was on the edge of the Police
Paddocks and was 530 ft by 348 ft.
A pipeline from the sedimentation
dam connected the two storages to Dandenong; part of this ran through Police Paddocks as an open channel.
The scheme was decommissioned in 1924, but the
pipeline water was made available to dairy farmers In the Lysterfield area until
about 1946.
The
creek users wanted sufficient water to flow down the creek but the
pipeline users did not want any restrictions. In addition the holiday
makers and residents of Belgrave wanted the reservoir as a swimming
pool. One of the major concerns was that pollution by swimmers would
make the water unusable by the dairy farmers.
The
State Rivers, tired of the complaints and constant wrangling,
threatened to take up the pipeline and remove it altogether. Ferntree
Gully Shire Council, pressed by South Riding representative Violet
Lambert, sought a lease of the pipeline and this was granted from
1940-1950 at 150 pounds per year, this amount to be recovered from the
water users.
As
the time for the lease to expire drew closer, Cr Lambert worked
constantly to think up a scheme whereby the pipeline water would be safe
for Lysterfield farmers. In 1946 she had instigated the holding of
annual Swimming Carnivals at the old storage basin, now no longer
required, and had successfully moved in Council that the area be used
for recreation purposes and named after the Shire Engineer, Tom Heany,
in the hope that this would encourage him to take an interest in its
development.
These
Carnivals were to help finance the maintenance of the pipeline and
money raised was also used to repay the Council after it agreed to
purchase the pipeline for 1250 pounds. This full amount was met from the
revenue from Heany Park, as was the Park Ranger’s salary. The whole
scheme was totally self-supporting and instead of polluting the water at
the source, people could now swim at the end.
It
is not known when these annual Carnivals stopped, or when the local
people lost interest in the park and working for it was abandoned. There
are results and official balance sheets up to and including the 1957
Carnival.
