Retired Regional Planner

David Langmore has lived in the Latrobe Valley for about 50 years.  He has had substantial professional involvement in strategic planning for Latrobe Valley. Since his retirement, he has continued to take a keen interest in many issues relating to the maintenance and improvement of the Latrobe Valley.  He has been actively concerned about the suitability and quality of arrangements for the planning of the rehabilitation of the Latrobe Valley’s massive open cut mines for nearly 45 years. 

David has a degree in science and diplomas in education and in town and regional planning.  His professional career has encompassed: 3 years as a teacher in Victorian secondary schools; 3 years in personnel and safety roles with Australian Paper Manufacturers at their Maryvale Mill; 25 years in a range of senior planning roles within the Victorian public service, mostly within Gippsland; and then finally 6 years as an independent planning consultant in Gippsland.

A book, authored by David, entitled “Planning Power: The uses and abuses of power in the planning of the Latrobe Valley” was published in 2013.  The book outlines and analyses the history of planning and development in the Latrobe Valley from 1920 through to the early 1980’s. 

David has been heavily involved in a variety of community groups both inside and outside the Latrobe Valley.  He has been an active member of the Great Latrobe Park group since it was inaugurated in 2017.  He is deeply concerned that lack of sufficient national, state and local government and community interest risks resulting in the Latrobe Valley being left for hundreds of years with a legacy of a series of gigantic, stagnant, unattractive, inaccessible and economically useless muddy dams in the voids of the former brown coal mines of the region.