Suburb-sized Melbourne quarry could rewrite record books

A suburb-sized former bluestone quarry for sale in Melbourne’s southeast is set to dig up a price record and land its owners a multimillion-dollar windfall.

The former Harkaway Quarry at 1-49 Noack Rd, Harkaway, near Berwick, spans 56ha making it bigger than several Melbourne suburbs including Gardenvale, St Kilda West, Princes Hill, Travancore and Kooyong.

CoreLogic records show the property last changed hands for just $960,000 in 2006, not long before it was decommissioned as a quarry in 2010.

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Barry Plant Berwick sales agent Calum Dabb says the quarry is now effectively a lake containing some 80,000 cubic metres of water below its placid surface.

The now gorgeous landscape hasn’t been seen by the public in decades.

“There’s a lot of natural beauty there,” Dabb says.

Early records show the quarry was operating in 1916, and Dabb says he believes it had been excavated for close to 100 years.

After a week on the market about 20 people have inquired – at least one from Sydney — though most are keeping their cards close to their chest.

While the massive size of the picturesque allotment is expected to lure developers, a green wedge zone limits it to 8ha subdivisions.

Farmers and even those looking for an ultra-private home site could also pursue the monster property.

While the lake would need to be remediated, there’s also a substantial amount of cleared land.

As a result pricing the property is difficult, though it’s still expected to reset the suburb’s record books.

“As an overall price it would be the record,” Dabb says.

A $1.8 million sale for 30 King Rd, Harkaway, is one of the most recent results for an 8ha allotment. At that level the seven possible subdivisions could be worth $12 million — though buyers would be likely to deduct remediation costs to fill in the quarry from the price.

CoreLogic records show the highest price paid in Harkaway to date is the $4.41 million splashed on an 8.23ha hobby farm at 2-12 Hyde Hill Rd in 2011.

There is also extensive vegetation across the property.

The quarry site is close to seven times its size, with Dabb believing it might be the biggest single title in the suburb.

“From what I could find it’s the third largest landholding in Harkaway, but the others that are larger are separate titles with an easement or a road running through them,” Dabb says.

“So this is the largest single piece of land I could find in Harkaway.”

The expressions of interest sale ends on June 4.

This article from the Herald Sun originally appeared as “Harkaway Quarry bigger than some suburbs set to smash record”.