Former Buninyong fire station going to auction next month

The old Buninyong fire station is set to go to auction on Friday, March 11 after the Buninyong-Mount Helen Fire Brigade moved to its new base next to the golf course.

After 67 years, the old fire station was starting to show its age and was no longer fit-for-purpose, especially when a new tanker the brigade has on order would not even fit through the old station's door.

Buninyong-Mount Helen Fire Brigade captain James Witham said the brigade had mixed emotions about the sale.

"We've got a great new facility, so we're pleased to have a more fit for purpose building but we've long outgrown this building," he said.

"The brigade's been here for 67 years and we've done just about everything we can to get as much life out of it as possible with expansions and modernisation and automation of some of the equipment, etc, but it's a small site, it's a small building, not as safe as modern buildings are these days, we got much more space in the new facility that we didn't have here."

Mr Witham said while some of the community would like to see the station retained for community use, there was also concern around making sure any future use fits the township character.

"There's probably also some interest in making sure it doesn't become something that's perhaps not fitting with the character of the Buninyong village and the historical CBD area, where there is a heritage overlay, so not having it turn into something that's not befitting of that character, I guess," he said.

"To whoever purchases it, whatever use this might have in the future, whoever might take it on, we wish them all the best. It served us well, it's got an extensive history, we still walk past, drive past this site proud of that history and we hope that someone else could get some good use out of it for years to come."

The brigade's longest-serving member Bruce Morley has been with the brigade since December 1990 and has seen a raft of changes to the station and it's equipment over the journey.

"There's a lot of that history associated with the brigade here so it's a bit sad to see it go, but we needed a new, updated facility. This was getting very small, not high enough and all that sort of stuff," he said.

"The first truck we had when I was here was an International and that was a V8 petrol driven, that's not really good in a fire ground, because petrol vaporises and causes problems. The other vehicle we had was a pumper, it was an old Toyota 1.8-litre pumper and it used to be very embarrassing if we were doing a fire going up the hill to Geelong, lights and sirens going, doing about 40km/h and all the other vehicles were passing us because it was that slow going up that hill. That's part of the memory of that time.

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"The area out the back was a meeting room and we had our turnout gear around the walls and then as we got more members, it was getting very cramped. We restored the old Merriweather and had that sitting here, we also had the tanker and the pumper, we didn't have much room to do a lot of other things. It's been very cramped for a long time and we've got the maximum use out of this facility, I think."

Allister Morrison from Ballarat Real Estate, who is the agent for the property, said it was rare to have a fire station go under the hammer.

"It's a pretty historical building. Many generations of CFA volunteers have gone through the place and you'd probably say multiple generations of families have probably had some sons and daughters go through the property and serve there. For the township of Buninyong, it's a pretty big event when the former fire station becomes something else," he said.

"I think people could use it for a range of different things and it'll be pretty exciting to see what pops up there in the future. But being in the location that it is, right in the heart of town, I think people will be pretty keen on it."

Mr Morrison said it would be interesting to see how much the unique and historical property sold for.

"We don't sell fire stations every day, so it's a bit of a unique situation and I think what it's worth to someone will depend very much on what their plans for the property might be and what they think they could use it for," he said.

"I think it's got a lot of importance to the community in Buninyong as well, so we'd expect there'd probably be a big turnout on auction day from the local community just to see what transpires and to get to feel for the level of interest in and what the future for it might be."

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