Residents living near a disused service station next to the Campbell shops have called on the ACT government to make the site clean and safe.
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A petition with 800 signatures was tabled in the Legislative Assembly this week by the Canberra Liberals member for Molonglo, Steve Doszpot, calling for the site's lessee to be forced to reattach gates, remove rubbish and bring forward a development application.
The business was closed after a hailstorm in February 2007, leaving behind cracked concrete, rubbish and growing weeds.
Since 2009, residents have appealed to several government directorates, wanting the "eyesore" cleaned up.
Petition organiser Mark Anderson said ACT Planning and Land Authority officials had explained the time allowed for the disused fuel tanks to be removed and for the site to be developed.
"I asked if some action could be taken against the lessee to force them to clean the place up and to submit a development application. The response that I got to that was that they would ask for some action but they wouldn't force them to do anything," he said.
Planning Minister Mick Gentleman wrote to Mr Anderson in October last year.
He said sites which were not more than 30 per cent covered in rubbish would not attract government attention.
Mr Anderson said that recently, "someone has gone in there with a whipper snipper and, after about 14 months, the gates were put on their hinges about a month ago".
He called for the block to be developed as soon as possible or used as a temporary car park in order to ease congestion around the busy supermarket and other shops.
On Friday, Mr Doszpot said community members and the opposition had written to several ministers about the continued problems at the abandoned site.
"The community has been very concerned about the potential safety hazard for the many children who walk past the site to and from school," he said.
"It has, in the past, been used as a dumping ground for rubbish and possibly dangerous substances.
"I call on the government to make the site safe and secure . . . as promised in November 2014, keep the site safe through regular inspection and repairs and clean the site up and keep it clean, as [a] matter of urgency."
In a statement, Mr Gentleman said the government encouraged and, when required, enforced the need for remediation and redevelopment of disused service station sites in Canberra.
"There has been significant progress on the remediation and subsequent development proposals for disused petrol station sites. However, some sites have complex remediation issues that can take a substantial amount of time to resolve," he said.
Officials were concerned about the residential amenity of Canberrans, Mr Gentleman said.
The government has three months to present an official response to the petition, with the relevant minister lodging a response with the Legislative Assembly clerk.
