Page 3408 - Week 08 - Wednesday, 17 August 2011
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As I said in April this year, when it comes down to it, it is all about fear mongering and their entrenched ideological hatred of the car and of what it represents, the industry it represents, or the freedom it represents, of people’s choice to be able to live their life as they want. What the car represents is a family. It is a family that lives in the outer suburbs of Tuggeranong or Belconnen and it opens up their opportunities to live their life as they wish.
The Greens here, and I believe the Labor Party as well, in their hatred of oil and their dislike of families, use things such as peak oil to limit the opportunities and freedoms that so many people in Canberra and around Australia do enjoy. This government, made up of the cosy Labor-Greens coalition, are about forcing Canberrans out of their cars, forcing families out of the suburbs. As I have said, this would be fine perhaps if we had a viable and efficient public transport system. However, we do not.
If this government is serious about prioritising a shift away from cars, it should be improving the bus network and other modes of transport rather than simply making it harder to park or harder to drive. As we know, ACTION is subsidised by millions of dollars each year by the ACT taxpayer, yet only eight per cent of the population are actually using the service. The government talk about improving the efficiency of the ACTION network, but the reality is that the network does not suit the needs of the remaining majority and there are no plans or definitive strategies to improve this situation. I wonder how many of the eight per cent that do use ACTION are actually happy with the service and how many are doing so simply because they have to.
As someone who believes in small government, I believe that the private sector are good managers and solve problems well. When it comes to parking, I would think there would be interest from the private sector in the construction and management of parking spaces, perhaps even structured or multistorey parking. However, the private sector needs certainty, and that goes for the car parking industry as well. The fact is that it is very hard for certainty to exist when the parking strategy is in draft form and has not been updated for four years. For four years, three months and 10 days we have been waiting for a strategy.
Last year, at a well attended public meeting in Hawker, the following points were raised by concerned residents when the government proposed to remove their car parks, amongst other changes. Some of these points included:
Hawker is a good site for ‘Park and Ride’ facilities, but if the car park is removed, this will no longer be an option.
Increased activity and development on the car park sites may make the roads around the centre more dangerous.
Car parking is an issue across Canberra. There needs to be a plan for the whole city to ensure that flow and convenience enable businesses to prosper. We cannot collapse into gridlock and expect businesses to survive.
Age care workers take elderly people to Hawker because of the convenience of the parking and the range of shops. We need to be able to park near the services. Public transport will not provide for the needs for an ageing population.
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