The new station
Mt Macedon Fire Brigade has celebrated the official opening of their new fire station today.
The local community gathered to mark the special occasion including CFA Chief Officer Jason Heffernan, the Hon. Mary-Anne Thomas MP and Mt Macedon Captain Tim Slattery.
The $4.04 million state-of-the-art station located on Mt Macedon Road has replaced the brigade's 42-year-old station.
CFA Chief Officer Jason Heffernan said the new station will provide modern facilities and features designed to improve service to the community.
"The new station features a three-bay drive through motor room capable of storing modern firefighting vehicles," Jason said.
"It also has a rear training yard, a hose drying tower, male and female turnout facilities, a workshop, a brigade office and communications room, a multi-purpose training room and kitchen.
"The station is a much larger facility for the brigade and its local community to utilise for many years to come."
Mt Macedon Captain Tim Slattery said the brigade is thoroughly enjoying their new home.
"It's incredible to see how far we've come from the early days where firefighting equipment was housed in a shed owned by the Water Trust board, to this modern fit-for-purpose facility," Tim said.
"This new station was a long time in the making. To assist Melbourne University architecture students with their academic requirements, we engaged with them to produce some renovation designs to our previous station in 2017.
"This work became the champion to the brigade's cause to receive funding for a new station.
"The brigade was also able to contribute $38,000 to improvements on the base design using donations we generously received from the community over the years.
"Our brigade responds to more than 40 call-outs each year and we have supported major incidents including the Ash Wednesday bushfires where 400 homes and seven lives were lost in the Macedon/Mt Macedon area.
"We also attended the February 2009 bushfires, the 2019/20 Black summer fires and flood and storm events in 2021 and 2022."
"Today we also celebrated a combined total of nearly 300 years of service from 14 of our members, plus a National Emergency Medal.
"I'm proud of our brigade's 40 members who are dedicated to protecting their local community and beyond, which they can now do from this incredible new station."