Dandenong Creek meanders for 53 km in Melbourne's south east. Bubbling from springs high up in the Dandenong Ranges, the waterway travels through forests and grasslands, urban and industrial areas, and billabongs and swamplands before flowing into Port Phillip Bay.

The creek and its surrounding environment has long been an important habitat to many native plants and animals. But with population growth, urbanisation, industrial development and climate change, the catchment’s natural environment is coming under increasing threat. This includes loss of habitat, declining species, increased pollution and poor water and soil quality.

The middle section of Dandenong Creek has undergone the most change over the last 200 years, since Europeans first arrived in the area.

Why are we focusing on the middle Dandenong Creek catchment?

In early settler days the catchment saw extensive land-clearing, deforestation, and draining of swamplands. Later, in the 1960s, the Dandenong Valley Authority replaced the creek’s winding flows, meanders and billabongs with straightened channels and underground pipes. While this may have helped reduce flooding in a growing urban environment, it also disrupted the creek’s natural flow, in turn impacting animal and plant habitat and biodiversity.

Through 'daylighting' construction works in 2017-2018 we replaced a section of this piped waterway with an open, flowing channel that more closely resembled the original shape of the creek to improve habitats and opportunities for revegetation.

As manager for waterways and sewerage across the Port Phillip and Westernport region, Melbourne Water has an important role to play in limiting further decline along this important and much-loved waterway.