YARRIAMBAICK Shire council is aiming to wipe out more black spots in its region.
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Round four of the federal government’s Mobile Black Spot Program opened in September, with community members encouraged to pinpoint priority locations with low mobile reception.
At its November meeting on Wednesday, Yarriambiack council passed a motion to nominate six priority locations within its shire for the program.
Those locations are near Lubeck, Roseberry, near Lascelles, Willenabrina, west of Rosebery and Reedy Dam.
In his report to the council, Infrastructure and Planning director James Magee said the council had worked with the Wimmera Development Association and the Wimmera Southern Mallee Regional Partnership to detect the locations.
“Our shire already has 25 mobile towers, which is a fair amount and there have been quite a few just put up recently,” he said.
“A lot of these proposed locations are near our silo art sites. This will help tourists get better mobile reception when they are at the sites. They are also close to emergency services.”
Mr Magee said the Lubeck location would included coverage of a CFA station and the Stawell Warracknabeal Road between Rupanyup and Glenorchy.
The Rosebery location would provide coverage to the town which includes CFA shed, cafe and silo art.
The site near Lascelles is on the Henty Highway and would provide coverage between Hopetoun and Lascelles.
The location at Willenabrina, west of Brim, is on the Warracknabeal Rainbow Road and would help coverage between Warracknabeal, Rainbow and Jeparit.
The site west of Rosebery would service the Hopetoun Rainbow Road between Hopetoun and Rainbow, and the Hopetoun West CFA shed.
The Reedy Dam location, east of Beulah, would service the Birchip Rainbow Road between Beulah and Birchip.
Optus switched on power to a tower in Yaapeet in August, which was built as part of round two of the federal government program.
The tower has improved services between Hopetoun and Rainbow. Work started on an Optus tower at Brimpaen in April, which will provide 4G and 3G services to people in the Laharum, Brimpaen and Wartook areas.
In July, the state government announced it would build new mobile phone towers at Areegra, Neuarpurr and Dergholm through the Victorian Mobile Black Spot Project.
The state government announced in January it had abandoned the fourth and final round of the federal government’s Mobile Black Spot Program in favour of its own system.
A map of registered blackspots in the Wimmera can be found here.
