New Picton Ferry Terminal Public Meeting 24th March 2021
Public Meeting being held by Guardians of the Sounds to address Picton Community Concerns over proposed NEW Kiwirail Mega Ferries.
The huge new MEGA Ferries will dominate the water space available for all users and adversely affect the land space when they discharge or load the monster vessels.
Meeting to be at Picton School, 5 Buller Street from 7-9pm. 24th March.
The Mega Ferries sheer size will limit dominate the entire harbour space causing Safety concerns and frustration on the daily movements of hundreds of vessels in and out of the small Harbour. They will carry up to 652 vehicles discharging within 30 minutes daily through Picton narrow urban roads passing Picton School and Kindergarten.
All Harbour users, Tourist operators, recreational users, commercial fisherman, sailing dinghies, rowers. Tourist kayak groups, swimmers will have limited access while the MEGA Ferry berths or departs. All users of the public water space will be affected to make one Government owned enterprise more profitable.
Excessive congestion with larger volumes of traffic will bring pollution issues, safety issues for pedestrians, school children and all road users.
The Government pushed the fast-track process has not given residents the full facts or time to fully absorb the effects of the intended terminal, roading or ferry operations. Consultation has been minimal with COVID stopping public meetings. The community have been left in the dark over the massive changes proposed to this tiny seaside township.
The public meeting is to understand how residents and users feel about the consultation process which Kiwirail conducted and how the town will be forced to change for the next 30 years to accommodate Kiwirail.
Guardians of the Sounds has been chosen by the Government to submit a community response to this town changing event and wants to hear the community’s viewpoint and concerns. The Picton harbour master will also be in attendance to answer Navigational questions from the community.
Meeting Attendance :
The meeting was well attended by MDC, Local Residents and Kiwirail. Several areas of concern were voiced by the community, congestion, public road safety, town access, air pollution and MDC and the IREX Kiwirail team are following up individually.