A Waipā District Council meeting tonight which was supposed to be an opportunity for staff to engage with residents about Cambridge Connections descended into a farce prompting mayor Susan O’Regan to leave when threats were made against her.
An estimated 500 plus people attended the session in Cambridge’s Bridges Church but there was little in the way of forgiveness as residents – some impacted by the preferred proposal showing a new bridge over the Waikato River going through their neighbourhood – vented at O’Regan, deputy mayor Liz Stolwyk and senior staff.
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Mayor Susan O’Regan, left, and deputy mayor Liz Stolwyk, right, talk to members of the public who attended the drop in session. Photo: Mary Anne Gill.
The turn out took council staff by surprise and 30 minutes into the drop in session, O’Regan decided it was time to talk to the public directly.
Referencing her media release earlier in the day, O’Regan said the timeframe for feedback now had been extended to 5pm on April 26 and that the community could comment on all four options, not just the preferred one.
She also took full responsibility for the communications blunder which left most residents finding out about the proposal from the Cambridge News.
She was interrupted by resident Danielle Schaad who said the proposal to put the bridge through Cambridge’s south western suburbs was wrong and that it should not go in “any backyards”.
It should go on a greenfields site out towards the Velodrome and St Peter’s School.
She hinted real estate prices had already started falling and repeated her submission to the proposal.
“It is our view that major roading projects like this should be pursued on undeveloped green field sites with a view to diverting traffic toward established arterial routes around residential and business properties, not through the middle of them. It is imperative that roading projects should serve the community, not annihilate character homes and facilities.”
A section of the large crowd which attended the Cambridge Connections drop in meeting
Transport manager Bryan Hudson spoke about why the bridge’s site – from the greenbelt between Marlowe Drive and Ihimaera Tce across to an area south of Alpha Street and west of Haworth Ave shown on a council map as a blue blob – was chosen.
The Victoria “High Level” Bridge would be closed to all but cycles and pedestrians in that scenario. Modelling had shown a bridge west of Cambridge towards St Peter’s School was not what was needed.
But by then the crowd mood had worsened and became ugly prompting O’Regan and Stolwyk to leave the meeting.
Community services manager Brad Ward called the meeting to an end saying the council realised it would need to hold another one in a more suitable place to allow for questions and answers in a more structured way.
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See: Put it there! Corridor for third bridge revealed
See: Cambridge Connections extended
Bryan Hudson speaking at the Cambridge Connections drop in meeting
