Page 2053 - Week 07 - Wednesday, 15 May 2013
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Let us look at some of the sites. Duffy has a site that is fenced off, a daily reminder of the 2003 firestorm. Duffy residents write to members of the Canberra Liberals on a regular basis seeking answers to when this painful reminder of the past will be developed into something new and fresh which will continue the healing process for the community and give a more lively feel to the dilapidated central shopping zone. It really is sad that, over a decade later, off the road there is a lovely bushfire memorial to facilitate healing but on the main road of the suburb where the locals drive and walk every day is a sore reminder of the most painful episode in the suburb’s history.
Rivett has a petrol station site that has been empty for well over a decade. The site boasts falling down shadecloth, fire-hazard length grass around the perimeter and tall weeds, and it gives the whole central area of Bangalay Crescent, where a number of children attend Noah’s Ark every day, a dilapidated, depressing feel. The site is a drain on the local community and really should be turned into something soon.
The Chapman site has seen recent excavation, but right here where hundreds of cars drive around the corner of Thring Street into Perry Drive to drop kids off at the school is a fenced-off, derelict site which also has simply provided a backdrop for the speeding that frightens local residents living on that corner for decades.
The Garran site has windows boarded up. There are several large oil and petrol drums by the building. The fencing is intact but the shadecloth barely covers the view of the vast, run-down, empty space. The grass seems to have at least been cut this past summer, but generally the abandoned feel is strong and the local residents wish the develop would hurry up and commence for what seems to be an intended medical centre for the site.
Campbell has a station which has been closed for over 10 years. There are no buildings left on this site. There are, however, several stretches of graffiti, including a blue and somewhat menacing snake and a panda bear. The graffiti is not at all obscured by the blue and green shadecloth stretching across some sections of the fence.
To the north of Civic, Watson has a particularly derelict block with an orange shipping container and a white shipping container on the site. The grass is especially long and there is graffiti of a large square eye on the side of the white container. There are also wire baskets and a water tank on the site. The grass is very long. The blue shadecloth on this block is falling down in places. There is also barbed wire around the top of the fence. Local residents of Watson would like to see this site turned into something and are sick of seeing the site on their daily walks.
The residents of Lyneham live with an empty petrol station site, too. It is almost entirely concrete. There are some shrubs outside the perimeter fence which could be better maintained, but the main issue here is an abundance of graffiti. There are green outlined letters spelling “A-O-D”, a word in very large bubble-like characters, and a little face on the old garage door with at least six fangs and two horns looking menacingly at passers-by.
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