Soaring land tax and charge payments equating to greater than $1000 a day have compelled one in every of Australia’s greatest and oldest drive-in cinemas to shut its doorways completely.
Lunar Drive-In, situated in Dandenong in Melbourne’s outer southeast, will shut down later this yr after proprietor David Kilderry bought the 5.92 hectare web site to developer Pellicano.
The web site, in Melbourne’s prime industrial zone, was listed with a $45 million asking value.
Lunar, which options 4 screens exhibiting nightly blockbusters, opened in 1956 with a single picket display screen and area for 650 vehicles earlier than it was closed and changed into a market web site within the Nineteen Eighties.
Mr Kilderry leased the land and reopened the drive-in with brother Matthew in 2002 earlier than shopping for the positioning in 2016.
He blamed sky-rocketing land taxes and council charges for the closure.
“Those two combined this year are just under half a million dollars,” he informed AAP.
“That really does sort of take away the ability to make any real sort of profit … It’s just the rampaging costs, essentially, that led to this difficult decision.”
The closure comes with an additional sting after Lunar’s homeowners spent $3.8 million on a restaurant that opened in 2020, simply earlier than cinemas have been closed as a part of the Victorian authorities’s COVID-19 pandemic measures.
But Mr Kilderry stated he had made peace together with his determination after lobbying the state governments for a number of years about land taxes.
“We just tried to see if there’s an alternative or an exemption like churches receive or caravan parks receive, but we had no luck,” he stated.
In Victoria, land used for out of doors recreation and cultural actions is exempt from the tax however solely when utilized by non-profit organisations.
Lunar is one in every of round a dozen drive-in cinemas nonetheless working in Australia.
They embody three in Melbourne, together with Lunar, and a minimum of one in each state besides Tasmania.
Mr Kilderry stated the decline of drive-ins started almost 40 years in the past with the introduction of VCRs and video leases.
Dromana Drive-In proprietor Paul Whitaker stated the closure of his closest competitor Lunar was unhappy news.
Mr Whitaker’s household has been concerned with the Mornington Peninsula cinema for greater than 60 years after his father constructed the drive-in.
He stated he was in a beneficial place as his land – which he described as cow paddocks – wasn’t value almost as a lot because the Lunar web site.
“We have no plans of going anywhere… it’s in my blood,” Mr Whitaker informed AAP.
Dromana Drive-In was the primary on the earth to introduce FM radio sound to the out of doors cinemas and Mr Whitaker stated it was essential to maintain innovating to remain related to clients.
Heddon Greta Drive In, within the coastal NSW metropolis of Newcastle, will shut its doorways in July this yr earlier than the land is subdivided into 44 residential tons.
Owner Scott Seddon stated that after 25 years he had “surrendered to the inevitable” and bought to a neighborhood developer.
“Historically, drive-ins were built on the outskirts of towns and cities on semi-rural land which, as the towns and cities grew, were taken over by suburbia,” he posted on Facebook.
But it might not be the ultimate present.
“We are looking at a couple of proposals to build in another location which is actually quite exciting,” Mr Seddon added.
