Government process “callous”: RedWATCH

Government process “callous”: RedWATCH

Government process “callous”: RedWATCH

BY LUCAS BAIRD

A convenor of a local community group has slammed the NSW Government’s treatment of the Waterloo community in regards to the suburb’s new metro rail station.

Convenor of Waterloo community group RedWATCH, Geoff Turnbull said that UrbanGrowth NSW had failed to appropriately inform the community and as a result they were outraged.

“It is the inevitable conclusion of the government handling it [The Waterloo Metro] the way they have been,” Mr Turnbull told City Hub.

“People don’t really have a sense of what is being talked about other than they are going to be upset and dislocated.”

“So far people really know nothing more than when it was announced,” he said.

Mr Turnbull said that rumours began to circulate because of a lack of concrete information, which created uncertainty and nervousness in the community.

He labelled the entire process as, “callous.”

Mr Turnbull’s comments come after UrbanGrowth made their first appearance at a RedWatch meeting since the announcement, last Thursday.

The meeting, held at the Factory Community Centre on May 5th, drew many community members who were opposed to the new developments.

Mr Turnbull said that the crowd was a good mixture of private, social and public housing tenants from the area.

One resident at the meeting labelled the project as a, “social experiment,” and, “disrespectful to the community.”

While another said the whole project, “sounds like a joke.”

Much of the disapproval at the meeting surrounded the elimination of community facilities and job providers that currently stand on the project site.

A member of the UrbanGrowth team, Troy Daly said that the project would help create jobs in the area and promote greater economic stability for Waterloo.

“There is 30 years of building to be done in the area,” Mr Daly told the meeting.

“There will be jobs in education at the university, health at RPA [Royal Prince Alfred Hospital] and more innovative fields that will pop up in Redfern.”

Despite the criticism, an UrbanGrowth spokesperson told City Hub that they believed the meeting was productive.

The spokesperson said that the meeting allowed them to better explain the master planning process and hear the communities concerns. They also said that they will continue to work with RedWatch to help inform the community of the ongoing developments.

At the meeting, the UrbanGrowth team said that the environmental impact statement of the project would be available by the end of the month, with the master plan expected around mid-year.

UrbanGrowth also said that the draft urban transformation strategy will be released in the second half of the year.

 

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