The Heart flood map & planning overlays
The Heart sees 93 flights a day, 2nd in Wellington, and is 84.7% flood-mapped.
Free map preview, then PDF reports from $9 - about the price of an iced latte on a public holiday.
A planning-constraint profile of The Heart
(Wellington, VIC) - 44.36 km², mapped from live council and
state overlay data. This suburb is highly constrained.
Profile updated 24 October 2026.
Constraint readout
44.36 km² - this suburb is highly constrained by planning overlays.
Elevation hillshade with street names, clipped to The Heart's boundary, with the flood, bushfire and environmental overlays drawn on top. Amber hatching is the published aircraft noise (ANEF) contour. Magenta is where aircraft were observed in the sampled period, brightest below 3,000 ft.
Nearby suburbs, nearest first
Aircraft noise and flight paths over The Heart
The ANEF contour is a published planning forecast and observed overflight is what a sampled tracking feed recorded - neither describes any individual property.
Inside an aircraft noise contour
10% of the suburb's land sits inside a published ANEF or airport-environs contour. Contours vary street by street, so whether a particular lot is inside one needs a property-level check.
Highest contour present
Under AS 2021, land at ANEF 30 and above is generally unacceptable for new houses and most noise-sensitive uses. The contour is a forecast, not a measurement at any one house.
Contours held
- Defence Airfields ANEF
- Victorian Airport Environs Overlay
Observed overflight - sampled 4 Sep to 24 Oct 2026
typical observed square 3 a day
Night movements: observed, lowest 6,500 ft - night is sampled as often as day, but night traffic is light, so this is a floor and no rate can be put on it.
How this is measured
Traffic is sampled rather than watched continuously, so every figure is a floor: aircraft not captured between samples are not represented. Rates are per 500 m square - the busiest square in the suburb, not a count of flights over the suburb - and a square is only rated where enough traffic was seen to measure it. Altitudes are above mean sea level. Flight paths change with runway use, weather, season and airspace design. This is a record of observed traffic; it is not a noise contour and not a planning control.
The Heart at a glance
How The Heart is zoned
Selling in The Heart? The zoning and planning overlays on this page are the controls a Section 32 vendor statement discloses.
Across its 44.36 km², The Heart is highly constrained by planning overlays. About 85% of the suburb sits within a mapped flood overlay, and 100% is flagged bushfire-prone. The dominant land-use zone is Farming Zone (FZ). The median lot measures about 166,495 m² across 169 parcels.
Who lives in The Heart
Census 2021 figures published by the ABS for the The Heart suburb boundary itself, not a wider region.
Socio-economic standing
ABS SEIFA 2021 ranks every Australian suburb. Decile 1 is the most disadvantaged tenth of the country, decile 10 the least.
Score 1026, and decile 7 within Victoria. The national average is 1000.
Population trend, 2001 to 2025
Estimated resident population of Longford - Loch Sport, the wider ABS statistical area containing The Heart. There is no annual population series published at suburb level, so this describes the surrounding area rather than The Heart itself.
3,830 in 2001 to 4,993 in 2025, up 30%.
Source: ABS Census 2021 and SEIFA 2021 (Suburbs and Localities), Regional Population (SA2), CC BY 4.0. Small counts are randomly adjusted by the ABS.
The Heart data sources and coverage
“Not mapped” means we hold no source layer for this suburb - never an all-clear.
| Dataset | Coverage | Publisher |
|---|---|---|
| Flood mapping | Mapped | Vicmap Planning and Victorian Government spatial services |
| Bushfire-prone mapping | Mapped | Vicmap Planning and Victorian Government spatial services |
| Zoning | Mapped | Vicmap Planning and Victorian Government spatial services |
| Heritage and environment | Mapped where published | Vicmap Planning and Victorian Government spatial services |
| Aircraft noise contours (ANEF) | Inside a held contour | Vicmap Planning and Victorian Government spatial services, Defence |
| Observed flight paths | Observed | adsb.lol, under the Open Database License |
| Demographics | Available | Australian Bureau of Statistics (2021 Census and SEIFA) |
Profile last materially updated 24 October 2026. See the methodology and full source list. Source data changes over time and critical decisions should be checked with the responsible authority.
Check a specific The Heart address
See exactly which overlays touch a single property - the interactive map is free. Need it on paper? A full planning PDF is just $9.
See what's in the $9 report →Aircraft have been seen below 3,000 ft over about 86% of The Heart. The report's Aircraft Overflight page narrows that to the address itself: how many aircraft a day, how low, and at what heights.
Building or pricing a slab? The $119 geotechnical desktop report covers geology, soils, bores and the indicative soil reactivity range to expect for a The Heart lot.
The Heart planning - frequently asked
Is The Heart flood-prone?
About 85% of The Heart falls within a mapped flood overlay, against the council-wide suburb average of 26%.
Is The Heart bushfire-prone?
Around 100% of The Heart is mapped as bushfire-prone, compared with a Wellington average of 96%.
Is The Heart affected by aircraft noise?
About 10% of The Heart sits inside a published aircraft noise contour, and the highest contour present is ANEF 30 - under AS 2021, land above ANEF 25 is generally considered unacceptable for new houses, and 20-25 conditionally acceptable with noise attenuation. ANEF contours are forecasts published per airport and used to control noise-sensitive development; they are not a measurement at any one house, and a property can sit under a flight path and outside every contour.
Is The Heart under a flight path?
Aircraft were observed below 3,000 ft over about 86% of The Heart, and over about 94% at any altitude up to 10,000 ft, in the period sampled (4 Sep 2026 to 24 Oct 2026). The lowest measured aircraft was at 500 ft, with an average of 1,500 ft. At the busiest point in the suburb about 92 aircraft a day were recorded passing over one 500 m square. Traffic is sampled rather than watched continuously and flight paths change with runway use, weather and season; the ANEF contour is the planning instrument.
What is the zoning in The Heart?
The dominant planning zone in The Heart is Farming Zone (FZ), though the suburb also includes Public Conservation and Resource Zone (PCRZ) and Public Use Zone (PUZ1).
Does The Heart have heritage-listed places?
No heritage-listed places are on record within The Heart.
What is the typical lot size in The Heart?
Across 169 surveyed parcels in The Heart, the median lot size is about 166,495 m². There are also 21 registered easements mapped in the suburb.
Is The Heart an advantaged suburb?
On the ABS SEIFA 2021 index of relative socio-economic advantage and disadvantage (IRSAD), The Heart scores 1026 and sits in decile 8 of 10 nationally and decile 7 within Victoria (decile 1 is the most disadvantaged tenth, decile 10 the least).
Compare nearby suburbs
| Nearby suburb | Distance | Flood mapped | Bushfire-prone |
|---|---|---|---|
| East Sale | 3.9 km | <1% | 100% |
| Cobains | 5.0 km | 20% | 100% |
| Clydebank | 7.4 km | 59% | 100% |
| Dutson | 8.9 km | 43% | 100% |
| Sale | 9.1 km | 41% | 78% |
| Lake Wellington | 11.8 km | 100% | 7% |
| Airly | 12.1 km | 16% | 100% |
| Montgomery | 13.7 km | 3% | 100% |
| Pearsondale | 13.9 km | 68% | 100% |
| Longford | 14.1 km | 5% | 100% |