- Don’t be kept awake night after night from Noise or Violence
- Don’t put up with the silliness any longer
- Make a stand
- You have rights
- Try the 9 Steps below
- Know your rights … Stand up for your rights
- If you want change in the current Liquor Licensing Laws lobby the State Government
- Think very carefully who you vote for in the November 2008 Melbourne City Council Elections
Step 1 Contact Liquor Licensing Victoria to obtain ‘permit conditions’ of liquor License of offending venue
Step 2 Contact Owner / Manager of Venue
Step 3 Contact Melbourne City Council
Step 4 Contact Victoria Police
Step 5 Contact Your Local State Government Member
Step 6 Assisting the Owner / Manager of the Venue, the Melbourne City Council, the Victoria Police and the State Government to clearly and precisely understand your concerns
Step 7 Still No Response … Upload onto Youtube!
Step 8 Informing the Media
Step 9 Legal … Class Action
The above ( and below ) mentioned steps are primarily geared towards providing complaint information with regard to amplified noise ( deep thumping/vibrating base sound from subwoofers and similar hi-fi music producing equipment emanating from bars/nightclubs ) that penetrates residential apartments, however, the steps could also be followed for other on going problems such as excessive crowd noises, violence and other general / illegal nuisances.
Step 1
Contact Liquor Licensing Victoria to obtain ‘permit conditions’ of liquor License of offending venue
All venues operate under different licensing conditions … by obtaining an offending venues liquor license operating conditions you will have tangible evidence when speaking with the venue operator, the police, Melbourne City Council and your local State Government representative.
Step 2
Contact Owner / Manager of Venue
Many owners / managers are very responsible operators and will try and work with you to resolve the issue /s.
- If you do not achieve a successful outcome by communicating directly with the venue owners / managers then proceed to step 3.
Step 3
Contact Melbourne City Council
Melbourne City Council are very friendly and helpful and have processes designed to help facilitate the management of noise problems for its CBD residents.
Through the course of their noise management process the council may ask you to keep a detailed log of the offending venue, detailing such things as times the amplified noise can be heard in your apartment and how long that noise lasted for e.g., “could hear noise coming into my apartment from 10:30pm till 4:30am on such and such a night” etc. You may be asked to keep such a log from four to eight weeks … in the past these logs have not provided very good results ( if any result at all ) for the complainant but give it a go.
→ Click here http://www.melbourne.vic.gov.au/info.cfm?top=46&pg=1631 to be directed to the Melbourne City Council's website and then click on the link "Making a noise complaint"
- If, after submitting your noise log back to the council for their evaluation ( or whatever other procedures they have asked you to follow ), you do not receive an adequate response or no response proceed to step 4.
Step 4
Contact Victoria Police
The Victoria Police are one of the most professional and best all round police forces in the world and definitely have better things to do with their time than run around the CBD telling bars/nightclubs to turn down their music, however, you should not hesitate to call them if the above two steps have, to this point, provided no results.
Ask the police to come into your apartment so they can actually hear the amplified noise for themselves. Depending upon how the police officers have been briefed by their Commanding Officer you can expect one of two responses from them …
If they ( the police that attend your call ) have been briefed along the lines that noise coming into your apartment from an offending venue is in fact a noise violation they will then go into the offending venue and ask them to turn down the music or if you insist they ( the police ) can issue the offending venue with an 'infringement notice' and if that same venue receives three such infringement notices the police can then take that venue to VCAT for disciplinary action which may result in the venue having its license revoked or severely amended so its late night operating hours could be cut back … however you must be prepared to back the police up if it reaches this stage by attending the VCAT hearing with them.
Remember ... 3 infringement notices served on the one bar/nightclub may result in the venue having its license revoked or its operating hours severely cut back.
A verbal warning by the police to the offending venue manager/owner is not enough, you must insist an 'infringement notice' is issued as this is considered as ‘evidence’ if further action of any kind needs to be taken against that venue.
Complaints about Licensed Premises: Regional Licensing Unit call 014 181 366. If mobile number is unattended: Victoria Police 000. Melbourne East Police Station call 9650 7077 (226 Flinders Lane, Melbourne), Melbourne City West Police Station call 9247 6491 (637 Flinders Street, Melbourne).
- If you do not achieve a successful outcome by communicating directly with the police then proceed to step 5.
Step 5
Contact Your Local State Government Representative
Tell your local State Government representative you have taken steps one to three ( as mentioned above ) but as to date have received no adequate outcomes and your mental / physical / psychological health ( due to lack of sleep ) is starting to go down hill fast, ask your representative if they can help you find a suitable outcome to the situation.
→ Click here http://www.bronwynpike.com/ to be directed to Bronwyn Pike MP, Member for Melbourne.
- If you do not receive an adequate response or no response from your Local State Government Representative proceed to step 6.
Step 6
Assisting the Owner / Manager of Venue, the Melbourne City Council, the Victoria Police
and the State Government to clearly and precisely understand your concerns
If after contacting the Owner / Manager of Venue, the Melbourne City Council, the Victoria Police and finally the State Government and you have still not received an adequate outcome ( like being able to receive a reasonable nights sleep from the hours between midnight and 6am ) then you may wish to assist them to better understand your situation by taking video footage (including sound) of the offending venue and then emailing that footage to the Venue Owner / Operator, Melbourne City Council, State Government and Police so they can all gather a clear and precise understanding of what your particular situation is like.
Step 7
Still No Response … Up load onto YouTube!
If after emailing your video footage of the offending venue to the Venue Owner / Operator, Melbourne City Council, State Government and Police you still receive no adequate response ( other than …"we are looking into it but it may take us some time to find a solution" ) then you may consider as a last resort uploading your footage onto YouTube so everybody concerned, including the general public, can gather a clear and precise understanding of what your particular situation is like.
→ Click here http://www.youtube.com/ to be directed to the YouTube website.
Step 8
Informing the Media
After uploading your video footage onto YouTube you could seek maximum exposure to your concerns by informing the print media and television media of your plight and let them know you have uploaded onto YouTube. The print media includes the main daily newspapers and the television media includes ‘the regular half hour news bulletins’ and ‘current affair shows’.
→ Click here http://aca.ninemsn.com.au/this-week/ to be directed to A Current Affair's website.
→ Click here http://ten.com.au/ten/ten-roving-reporter.html to be directed to A Current Affair's website.
→ Click here http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/ to be directed to ABC's 7:30 Report website.
→ Click here http://www.theage.com.au/ to be directed to The Age's website.
Step 9
Legal … Class Action
If steps 1 through to 7 yield no satisfactory results get the backing of your Owners Corporation ( and if possible other nearby affected residents / Owners Corporations ) and present your case to a legal firm to see if you have a possible case to claim some form of compensation from the offending venue ( or any other entity who owes you a ‘duty of care’ ) due to loss of sleep ( which could cause any number of ‘health and safety’ problems for you/your family ). Even potential loss of asset value ( namely your apartment ) due to other businesses ( namely the offending venue in question ) bringing down the desirability of your residential area could be cause for legal action and possible compensation.
Why does bar / nightclub amplified music bother CBD residents so much?
Quite simply because it is a sound / noise that can not be blocked out, it literally penetrates / vibrates through the walls and windows of nearby buildings.
Unlike other acceptable and ‘natural’ everyday city noises like cars, car horns, people talking, early morning garbage trucks collecting rubbish, council workers repairing city streets etc the deep thumping/vibrating base sound from subwoofers and similar hi-fi music producing equipment coming from bars/nightclubs is not just a ‘come and go’ noise, it ( amplified music ) coming from bars/nightclubs is a monotonous continuous noise that is forced upon nearby residents from any where between 11:00pm till 5:00am four to five continuous nights a week.
Why don’t residents simply close all windows and hang thick curtains to stop the noise coming in?
Due to the very unique length of the sound wave, produced by the deep thumping/vibrating base sound produced from amplified music equipment ( subwoofers in particular ), they ( the sound waves ) literally penetrate or vibrate their way into nearby buildings and no amount of soundproofing from the residents side would ever be able to stop it ( the sound ) coming or vibrating its way into their apartment ... it ( the sound ) must be contained at its source.
What has caused this problem?
Opening a ‘bar’ is one thing …extending the operating hours and then turning that bar into a nightclub is quite another.
Many of the current smaller to medium sized bars ( now nightclubs ) have done just this ... extended their trading hours from 10:00pm till midnight, then to 3am, then to 5am ... it has resulted in an explosion of nightclubs ... not ‘cool and sophisticated bars’ as some would like to believe .
Many of these small to medium sized bars / nightclubs are operating out of buildings that simply were never intended, or built, for the purpose in which they are now being used hence the stresses placed on those buildings can not cope with the by-product/s of their owner/s output … namely ( but not confined to ) the amplified noise ( deep thumping/vibrating base sound ) they produce … it ( the noise ) bounces / vibrates straight out the ( usually open! ) front doors and windows and straight in to the homes of nearby residential apartments.
Definition of a bar → Arguably a bar is a place people gather after work ( or during work ) for a relaxing drink and maybe a meal ... possibly there will be some light background music playing.
Bars usually close at 12 midnight.
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Bars are places people usually go to "wind down" and relax.
Definition of a nightclub → Arguably a nightclub is a place where people gather after working hours ( usually after 10:30pm ) to enjoy a night of dancing, socializing and drinking … nightclubs will always play loud music as this facilitates the dancing, socializing and drinking.
Nightclubs usually close between 3am to 5am
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Nightclubs are places people usually go to get "wound up" and excited.
There is a huge difference between the two with nightclubs being far more detrimental to their surrounding environments than bars and this is where the problem has arisen … too many entrepreneurs have opened ( or bought into ) small bars with full intentions of extending their operating hours ( something which has been amazingly easy to do! ) and then operating them as nightclubs. Many of the smaller to medium sized bars/nightclubs are operating out of premises that are acoustically not able to cope with the stress of the music/noise that they produce ... basically their 'industrial waste' ( noise ) goes straight out onto the street and into nearby apartments.
Complaint Information Website for Melbourne City Residents
Melbourne CBD
