MIDDLE GROUND: Community woes lead council to make Corryong car parking change

At a special meeting on Wednesday, February 21, Towong Council unanimously voted to reduce the width of the footpath already under construction on Hanson Street to allow for the extension of angled parking bays on the road.

The new plans will see the lateral depth of parking bays jump to 5.2 metres from 4.8 metres, with 40 centimetres to be taken off the proposed footpath width, which will see it reduced from 5.05 metres to be 4.65 metres from shopfronts.

Towong Council stated the aim of wider footpaths was to provide space for trees and encourage more outdoor dining.

Councillor Peter Dikschei put forward a new motion at the meeting off the back of a petition and a host of community concerns regarding safety with the new parks on the westbound side of Hanson Street between the roundabouts on Donaldson and Jardine streets.

He added a second part to the motion, which stated the cost of the project should not exceed the current budget without a resolution of council.

"Despite the current design meeting all legislated safety standards, I cannot ignore the concerns that have been expressed publicly by members of our community," Cr Dikschei said.

"I also conducted some private research and received over 30 responses, with a majority expressing concerns about safety or parking functionality.

The council's acting infrastructure and environment director Vilfried Correa said the redesign of the section already completed would cost around $80,000 and take six weeks to complete.

"We will be able to fit the redesign work within the budget," he said.

Cr Dikschei said he had spoken to business operators on Hanson Street and revealed all had told him the changes would be an acceptable compromise.

"I believe it is worth paying to help reduce the concerns that have been expressed by the community," he said.

"Although this motion does not lead to a perfect outcome, it is clear to me and most others that nothing will. It does, however, provide a compromise that attempts to address aspects of the community's concern without ignoring the substantial contribution of those that engaged earlier."

Cr Aaron Scales, who put forward a motion at a special council meeting on January 10 to push on with the project, revealed he started to have doubts afterwards.

"Cr Dikschei rang me and we had a discussion and decided we needed to call a special meeting and address the issue again and see what we could do about it," he said.

Mayor Andrew Whitehead said it was "better late than never" and "a good compromise for everyone concerned".

"I think if we'd had the level of interest in the community when we first started the consultation process, the design for both sides of the street would have been different," he said.

"All I can say is I encourage people to really engage when the consultation process is happening because I think we'll get a lot better result for our communities."

Cr David Wortmann said while he was reluctant to make changes to a project that had already started, due to time delays and increased costs, he supported the motion after being reassured it would meet the time frame and stay within budget.