Plans have been lodged for a new two-storey childcare centre to be built at Cardigan in the Ballarat West Employment Zone.
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It will be the first childcare centre in the rapidly-growing employment precinct, providing a care option for parents working at newly-established businesses in the zone.
The proposed site on Spearwood Road, is in the new Acacia housing estate in Cardigan.
The new centre will feature outdoor play areas for older children at ground level, and for babies and toddlers on the second floor, with four rooms catering for 120 children from birth to school age.
Included are two rooms running three-year-old and four-year-old, kindergarten programs for 30 children of each age.
According to planning documents, the centre will operate from 6.30am to 6.30pm employing 21 educators and carers among the staff.
"The addition of a childcare centre will cater to the local families that have children of four years or younger who would have to travel away from the area because of the lack of such facility in this precinct," developers wrote in their planning application to Ballarat Council.
"The proposed development will service the nearby community of residents of the low-density housing acting as a suitable transition for the industrial employment zones to the north."
The 2000sqm lot in Spearwood Road was listed as sold for $330,000 in June, 2020.
It continues a boom in childcare centres being planned and constructed at a rapid pace across Ballarat as the city's population continues to surge.
According to Australian Bureau of Statistics census data, between 2016 and 2021 the number of households with children in the City of Ballarat increased by 2146 households, or more than 14.1 per cent. And the number of children aged under five years living in the City of Ballarat increased seven per cent to 6608.
IN OTHER NEWS
In Alfredton, Jenny's Early Learning Centre opposite The Arch is due to open early next year, as is The Y's 114-place Brown Hill Early Learning Centre and Swim School.
Construction is underway on a large Brady Bunch childcare centre next to Phoenix P-12 Community College which will be the group's third centre in the Sebastopol-Delacombe area and nearby at the corner of Ascot Gardens Drive and Webb Street in Delacombe there are advertising boards for another new childcare centre.
It follows planning applications earlier this year for two new multi-million dollar centres; a a $2.6 million, 116-place child care centre and attached cafe/take-away food outlet on the corner of Ballarat-Carngham Road and Presentation Boulevard in Winter Valley, and a 122-place child care centre and medical centre at 214 Stawell St North, Brown Hill, valued at $2.5 million.
Other centres are under construction in Ballarat Central, Lucas, Mount Clear and other parts of the city.
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