Gidgegannup: Planning Wars

So my sleepy back-water hometown is about to explode.
When I was growing up there Gidgegannup was a massively expansive locality with a tiny population. Probably a few thousand people spread over a suburb with boundaries roughly as big as a cattle station.
By the time I left in 1999, a lot of our neighbours farms had been cut-up into five acre blocks and the good doctors and lawyers of this world were buying blocks out there and building weekenders.
The mood and feel of the place had already changed irreparably by the time I left.
Now, yesterday, a company called Port Bouvard Limited (Yes, you guessed it, they have a bit of a history of turning nice peaceful outlying areas into inner-looking wedding-cake-house bespeckled developments) has announced a $110million redevelopment of Gidgegannup... including residential lots.
Gidgegannup rather famously has only a few (I think there are maybe five) residential lots. It's about to have farm-loads of them.
For me, it is a little sad. Not incredibly sad, as my connection with the place is lost and I don't get pangs for it in the least. I'm also not an essentially anti-development person.
But I'm a little sad because Gidgegannup was unique. And a lot of people lived there for a long time enjoying that unique environment. But not any more. If this development goes ahead, Gidgegannup will be just like Darlington or Glen Forrest or Kalamunda.
It will be Ellenbrook at Altitude.
I'm glad I got to live there while it was something special. I'm glad I don't live there now or I'd be forced to stand in front of bulldozers and print fliers and ring newspapers.
But, from my present distance, I'm not actually convinced it will be a bad thing for the town. They'll need to expand the school. It will bring scheme water and deep sewerage to the area (Good luck, by the way, digging through the rock gentleman. It is not going to be as easy as you think. Those hills ain't made of sand). Ultimately, it will lead to the town attracting much more attention and funds from the local council than it currently does.
But that true village-style community I grew up in: that is dead. It was already dying, but this will kill it dead. I used to know everyone in that town. And everyone knew our family. Those days are gone. Hopefully the pioneering families of Gidgegannup with be remembered. That's about all I'd ask.
In the interim, all I can really do is quietly close my eyes and whisper 'Goodbye Gidgegannup'.