SUE and Lou Marchesano have been waiting to find out if their former orchard in Pickering Brook can be developed into urban lots.

They have 4ha of land on which they don’t have enough water anymore.

“This is why we can’t run an orchard,’’ Mrs Marchesano said.

“So we took the trees out over 20 years ago.

“(Also the town) has lost a hairdresser, a grocery store, petrol station – the numbers are going down – we need more people in our town for the Pickering Brook Sports Club as well and we just need more people in the town.

“I spoke to Matthew Hughes about it and he approached Rita Saffioti – she was the planning minister at the time.’’

A working group was set up with Mr Hughes chairing the group with all the government departments at the table, including the Department of Fire and Emergency Services and the Department of Water and Environmental Regulation (DWER).

“They took four years and they came to a decision that they were going to increase our town and so they put that to the (project) taskforce.

The project taskforce included the then transport and planning minister, the then regional development minister, the then deputy premier and the Western Australian Planning Commission (WAPC) chair.

“They came out here and had a big meeting and said ‘Yes this is what we are going to do, this is the area we’re going to do’ and then that was it.

“Nothing else has happened and that was five years ago.

“They keep saying they are investigating the area.

“Anyway now (DWER) has finished their investigation and now it’s up to DFES.

“DFES are holding it up – that’s 7.5 years they’ve been investigating.

“We just want to know what is happening.”

She said she thought they were going to go ahead with it but had heard they were going to wait until after the election.

“Why are they waiting until after the election?

“It was an election promise that they would do this.’’

Mrs Marchesano said another thing was the school only had 40 students and they didn’t want the school to close.

“So we just need more people to keep everything going.’’

The Pickering Brook and Surrounds Perth Hills tourism product gap analysis was published in March 2020.

One objective of the study was to determine gaps and opportunities for future tourism product development in the Perth Hills, to complement and add value to the current offer.

Another study objective was to identify potential regulatory, planning, infrastructure or economic barriers and how to address them to facilitate tourism development and economic and social revitalisation of Pickering Brook and surrounds.