Fred

go the greens! Good luck getting Qlders to pay a toll for it.

Jules

I thought the 60 minutes program last Sunday was a real eye opener about Sydney & how people are spending so much time travelling in their cars to work because of grid lock there. It is so bad that it making people sick and they are stressed out.
It challenges us here in Brisbane to think about the type of future we want because I believe we are heading in the same direction as Sydney. We should be making responsible decisions about how we want our lives to be
The Kenmore bypass, tunnels under peoples homes & smoke stacks, all these roads only encourage more traffic into the city past many, many of thousands of homes.
The current decisions will increase carbon emmissions and make it a polluted place to live. The current government does not appear to be doing this, I want them to fix the public transport new light rail, bridge at Bellbowrie for commuters to get to rail, transit lanes for buses and more bike paths.
This is the way will to a sustainable future and a better quality of life. I don’t want Brisbane to be the next Sydney, NO THANKS

Penny Behan

Did you see the news tonight and Anna Bligh stating cars, loss of habitat and dogs are the cause of why we may not have Koalas in SEQ in 2028. She spoke of high fences to keep dogs out of habitat, reducing destruction of habitat, building tunnels rather than open freeways, and banning dogs in certain areas.
So - do what you can to advise the Premier and our policians that the Kenmore Bypass will destroy Koala habitat, break the bushland link of FTP to Pullenvale further in effect isolating FTP habitat, definitely lead to more cars and more high density housing surrounding the corridor and yes probably more dogs. From what our Premier says, the large dogs are the preditors of Koalas.
If the pre-feasibility study is right and crime goes up in the area if they build the Kenmore Bypass, I will be getting a Rottweiler to replace our Cocker Spaniel!
Save our suburbs and the Koalas!

Pamela McNeil

I agree Jules the 60 minutes program was very interesting! also one of the people featured was a fellow who lives in Brisbane and he was the one testing the Brisbane levels of pollution from cars. I wrote his name down because he may be an expert we can use in the future. The over-riding message was Public Transport is the way to go..why can’t our our government at all levels, hear this.

Kathy(2)

Re Penny’s comments - it does seem rather contradictory to suggest putting up fences and banning dogs to save koalas but then cut a swathe through green space from Karalee to Kenmore destroying who knows how many koalas’ ‘homes’. The ridiculousness of the bypass is we sometimes have to fight to remove a dangerous tree from our own property (council permission)but the state government plans on destroying thousands in one foul swoop - it makes a mockery of all their ‘green’ talk!!

And I’ve said this before but I’m STILL amazed there’s so few letters accepted by the Courier Mail about the bypass. To date I’ve seen two!! Strange when you’d expect half of Brisbane to be up in arms about what the bypass and Toowong tunnel etc really is, that is a long haul truck route through densely populated inner suburbs. I can’t believe any sane thinking government/council would even contemplate such a move. Yes, solutions need to be found for the congested roads throughout Brisbane but no matter how I look at it, deliberately encouraging thousands more vehicles into inner suburbia is a most odd way to go about it.

anon

Pamela - our governments don’t want public transport because enough of us haven’t shouted it to them so loudly that they want to do something. People will use cars with the lack of public transport. Keep shouting!

Jules

Kathy2 it’s BIZARRE all the green talk from council & government about the environment. The city council has allocated millions of dollars in this budget for tree planting across Brisbane, 340,000 trees to start with and then so much more.
Crazy when you think that there are enough trees from Fig Tree Pocket to Karalee to start a new national park, also not forgetting the Pullenvale ward is reknowned for its biodiversity.
Leave the trees where they are save the koalas, save the taxpayers and save all the people in the suburbs in the west.

Penny Behan

This forum was really interesting to attend. They had many speakers. A town planner presented on the myth of building more roads to increase capacity to solve congestion. He demonstrated amazing statistics that showed that in major projects in Sydney, building these freeways actually increased congestion more than if they had done nothing. Also it looked at international cities and showed those with more road capacity per person, had more congestion, slower speed per KM and much more pollution. This he advised was because people drove more and these cities did not have adequate public transport as an alternative. He dispelled the myth that carbon emissions are reduced by building these freeways for these reasons and others. It does make me think we have our alternatives to the KB right but we must detail them in one document and promote them.

Lauren

It was an informative discussion, now to the best of my recollection:

* Toowong Cr Peter Matic did not attend – which angered the Toowong residents who are against the tunnel, or against the road widening in Toowong.

* A speaker from Save Our Inner West outlined how ineffective and hazardous the M5 tunnel in Sydney is.

* Another speaker discussed the effects of pollution and IIRC questioned the processes of the national standards body (readings are apparently not taken at roadside or tunnelside, but at least 500m (?) away).

* There was an ALP councillor from the Northside who spoke about how to attempt to lobby against the Toowong Tunnel.

* One of the speakers showed a summary of all the proposed road building for Western Brisbane. Although most road/freeway projects are presented to the public individually, in reality, it adds up to major highways through the western suburbs.
eg linkages of the Cunningham Hwy to Warrego Hwy to Moggill Pocket arterial to Kenmore Bypass to Centenary Highway to Toowong Tunnel. All estimated to cost 7.5 billion dollars.

He also dispelled the myth that “building more roads is green because free-flowing traffic creates less emissions”. In fact, passenger car emissions are primarily related to vehicle kilometres travelled.

While on my way home from the meeting, a radio station was discussing how the Victorian State Government is secretly considering allowing B-triples (trucks with 3 extension carriages) on Victorian Roads in an effort to ease congestion:

http://www.drive.com.au/Editorial/ArticleDetail.aspx?ArticleId=55803

http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,24139846-661,00.html

Will Qld follow suit? Is this the future for our western suburbs? Are we comfortable sharing our local roads with triple-trailers?
Large freight trucks + commuter traffic = fatalities …

Kathy(2)

Here I go, repeating myself again, but I STILL don’t understand why heaps more people aren’t putting two & two together and throwing up their hands in horror at what the powers that be intend doing to Brisbane. The Warrego to Kenmore ‘link’ and the Toowong tunnel will have a huge flow-on effect to the inner city bypass and beyond, affecting so much more than just ‘our’ side.

Can someone please explain in what separate universe does it make sense to deliberately channel hundreds more heavy vehicles into inner suburbia when we have to contend with too many of them already. Lauren’s last point above says it all – cars and trucks do not mix, especially now petrol prices have forced many of us into ‘mini’ cars. If the situation wasn’t so disastrous I’d fall about laughing whenever I hear reference to Queensland as the Smart State.

Fred

people are self centred Kathy and couldn’t give a rats what happens to someone else if they feel they are gaining one. Letters in the paper prove it. The Kenmore Freeway will result in heaps more cars and trucks from Ipswich, leaving the rail and existing roads to come through Kenmore. They will bridge the Moggill Ferry to allow more on Moggill Road and even more will come via Mt Crosby Road. Then, you know what will happen next - those people will call for the Warrego extension of the Moggill Pocket Arterial. It one day may end up taking more than the Ipswich Motorway - hopefully not in my lifetime! Those people are sheep - won’t believe it until it is too late.

Kathy(2)

So sad Fred, to think people are that selfish, i.e. pushing for a road they KNOW is going to be a horror highway just to get themselves a quicker trip to wherever. Surely they must realise an arterial road through our suburbs will destroy the area forever! After all this time and with all the info out there, there’s no excuse for not being fully aware of what’s involved so anyone who still believes it will just be a local road really are the sheep you mentioned.

I don’t know how Bruce Flegg and Margaret de Wit sleep at night – perhaps I’m naive but I would have thought most rational thinking politicians WOULDN’T want such a nightmare road ripping a path through their whole electorate.