Links Ave petition organiser Matt Nicholson was joined by a crowd of supports at the Tauranga City Council meeting. Photo / Samantha Motion
Links Ave petition organiser Matt Nicholson was joined by a crowd of supports at the Tauranga City Council meeting. Photo / Samantha Motion
A crowd calling for an end to the controversial Links Ave bus trial was left frustrated after the council meeting they attended was abruptly halted.
Tauranga City Council commission chairwoman Anne Tolley adjourned the public meeting after 10 minutes when the crowd of about 30 people packed into the public gallery began calling out questions and criticisms of the four-month trial, which has turned the street into a cul-de-sac mainly only able to be used by buses.
The adjournment came after a petition signed by 5625 people was presented to the council by its organiser Matt Nicholson. It called for the trial to stop and for all $150 fines issued for alleged misuse of the Links Ave bus lane - previously reported to have totalled more than $1.4 million - to be refunded.
Nicholson told the meeting the trial was not fit for purpose, with inadequate notification and confusing signage and layout.
"Fining during a trial is not an effective way to engage your community," he said.
"Families should not have to choose whether to feed their children this week or pay the council."
The signs warning drivers of the Links Ave cul-de-sac trial. Photo / Talia Parker
He said safety issues that prompted the trial had been moved to other streets in the area.
He said a Golf Rd resident told him there had been accidents due to increased traffic and parking on that street and it was now "more unsafe than Links Ave was".
He said an Ascott Rd resident had been fined five times, and had been denied a waiver to exit her own street three times. He said some people were facing more than $1000 in cumulative fines.
He likened the trial to "cutting off someone's arm when you're trying to save their leg."
Nicholson asked the council why, if the fines were to protect children, the trial was operating outside school commute hours.
Tolley had earlier said the petition would be received and that staff would prepare a report for a later date.
She told petitioners the council's livestream of the meeting had failed and had not captured Nicholson's presentation, prompting grumbling from the crowd.
She said the trial was almost at the halfway point and this would be "an opportunity for us to have a look at what's happened to date".
She asked commissioners and staff if they had any questions for Nicholson. None did.
The public gallery was packed for the Links Ave petition presentation. Photo / Samantha Motion
When community members began calling out from the public gallery, she said the meeting was "not an opportunity for the public to have a conversation".
If people wanted to speak in the meeting's public forum they could have asked to in advance, she said.
When the riled crowd continued calling out, Tolley called a five-minute adjournment. Commissioners and most staff left the meeting, being held at the Bay of Plenty Regional Council headquarters.
"Tolley's rules only" and "what a farce" were among the calls from the crowd as they exited.
By-election candidate Sue Grey, Outdoors and Freedom Party, hosted an impromptu live-streamed "public meeting" in the room where petitioners and their supporters complained of being warned and dealing with more congestion on the surrounding streets.
One said his 89-year-old widowed neighbour was "dying of loneliness" because her friends do not visit anymore after being fined.
Many of the petition supporters stayed in the room waiting for the commissioners to come back.
When the meeting resumed, Tolley reiterated that staff would do a report on the petition and said this would likely come to the next council meeting on June 13.
She said the council was considering arranging a "citizens' assembly process" for the final two months of the trial.
This would mean tasking a group of residents representing various parties with different interests in the trial with looking at a solution for after the trial ends. They would be able to seek independent traffic expertise.
She said staff would also look into this for the report to the next council meeting.
The trial would continue, she said. "We are just starting to see behavioural change."
Tolley said people would be welcome to speak at that meeting but must follow the process.
"Thank you to everyone who came along today, we know it's a significant issue. That's why the elected council for two terms, I think, struggled with it."
She said a safety report found the safety of children was the top priority. "We have to act."
