Hundreds of mourners gathered on Monday at St Marks Church Hall in Fawkner to celebrate the life of John Englart. John died unexpectedly at home earlier this month.

Among the many who paid tribute to John’s life and work was State MP for Broadmeadows, Kathleen Matthews-Ward. In particular, Kathleen spoke of their shared dream of completing the Ring Road link of the Upfield Shared Path and pledged that “We will not rest until this is completed”. We have reproduced her moving tribute below.

I was very shocked and saddened to hear of John’s passing and honoured to be asked to speak briefly today.

It’s hard to believe that such an indomitable spirit, an inspiring and indefatigable advocate and such an icon of Fawkner, is no longer among us.

His children and friends should be so proud of what he has achieved and what his legacy of advocacy will continue to achieve for our community and for the planet.

It’s almost exactly a year to the day that we were here in this very hall celebrating the life of my own father, also a strong campaigner for social justice, and I pass on my deepest condolences to his daughter Tarryn, Erin, Jesi, Kate and the rest of the family and so many of his good friends and comrades here today. He leaves an huge gap in our lives and in our community.

He truly lived his values each and every day and you can all be very proud of his commitment to social and environmental justice, his life’s work and his legacy that will live on.

In our many conversations we never really spoke much about him a person, but from his actions and words you could tell he cared deeply about humanity. Our chats were often about the effects of climate change on the vulnerable and he knew deeply that improvements in access to quality active and public transport, especially for those without a car, were imperative for the planet, for social justice and for opportunity for all – he fought tirelessly on this front.

Although his active time at Merri-bek was after I had finished my terms as a councillor, and had a break from elected political life whilst in the thick of babies and toddlers, I continued to keep an eye on local issues, in particular the Moreland Bicycle Users Group forum.

I would always read with interest the thoughtful and well research contributions, that always made a lot of sense, from Takver, who in my head, for some time, was an Asian woman cyclist living in Fawkner – I will blame the fog of early motherhood!

I may have seen him around at many festivals and events – he was always a very visible and well loved member of the community, but we first met properly over a coffee in Bonwick street in late 2022 during the state election.

We had a great and wide ranging chat covering topics such as synthetic turf, native timber logging,  the potential for local production of electric vehicles at the old Ford factory, aviation emissions and the need for a Melbourne to Albury high speed rail, the need for residential gas reforms, the senselessness of black roofs, and of course, active transport, the Upfield train line and the Upfield and Merri Creek bike paths, through both Hume and Merri-bek and beyond to Wallan.

We had both held a long-term dream of completing the Ring Road link of the Upfield Path too. For me it was since my time on the Transporting Moreland forum in the early 2000’s and I share his immense frustrations with the delays on that final stage, first funded in 2018.  Sadly, this was the topic of my last correspondence with him and continued representations with the Minister’s office. We will not rest until this is completed.

I would have loved to ride with him past the mob of kangaroos in the cemetery and I hope that we can do a memorial ride for him along this path in the very near future. And hopefully one day we can all ride together in his honour past a new station at Campbellfield, along the Somerton link, and up to Wallan, and then home along the Merri Creek on linked paths through the marram baba parklands.

I will always be grateful for his generosity in sharing his incredible knowledge and I will miss that aspect, among so many others. I’d often ring him when I needed to understand a local project or priority better, particularly the technical details of the Upfield line, the platforms, the turnbacks, the options, the staging and the priorities – he was my “go to” train nerd.  He’d also happily do further research for me, find documents and send it all back in a form I could easily use for a budget bid or the like.  His generosity was boundless and always in the spirit of getting the best outcomes he could, for both people and the planet.

As a small tribute to him, I spent this weekend compiling all the research he has sent me over the years (an 86 page document) and I have highlighted the bits that I can cut and paste for years to come.

I will also continue to use his info and research to advocate for changes to policy in many areas including waste, reducing energy and heatwave vulnerability, rental reforms, and Increasing tree canopy.

My good friend Jo is here and I remember during her departing speech from council, hearing her inspiring vision of a possum being able to get all the way from Brunswick to Gowanbrae without touching the ground. A vision I’m sure John would have shared.

He even helped me out with info on inland rail and the Jacana station.

His knowledge knew no bounds, and his tireless persistence was an inspiration to me personally.

I can only hope that can I keep up his level of energy for the good fight into my 70s too.

As Tarryn, Greg, Faith and Jan wrote in their beautiful tribute – “His research and legacy will certainly live on, and his writing will always remain a valuable source for many years to come.

I know he, and so many of us here, also felt deeply the plight of the innocent people of Gaza. May he, and they, rest in peace and may we all continue to advocate for human dignity and social justice.

Vale John, you were an inspiration and an irreplaceable source of knowledge. Thank you for fighting the good fight your whole life long, and may your indominable spirit live on in each of us.