Frustrated Ashburton councillors call out ‘road cone mania’
An Ashburton councillor has hit out "road cone mania" in the town and is calling on the council to follow Auckland's lead on the issue.
Councillor Richard Wilson said he is a fan of Auckland mayor Wayne Brown's crusade to make health and safety realistic.
The Auckland mayor commissioned an independent report into the temporary traffic management system in Auckland.
The Ernst & Young Global Limited report found existing rules and regulations incentivised contractors to cause maximum disruption to maximise profits.
The report showed that under the direction of Brown, Auckland Transport had reduced its temporary traffic management spend by $1.27 million since February.
Mid Canterbury farmer Ray Logan expressed frustration with the “over-the-top” use of road cones on Walnut Ave in Ashburton at the start of July.
He said the number of cones is completely unnecessary.
Councillor Carolyn Cameron shared her frustration with the Walnut Ave situation, where “there are lots of road cones, and I’m sure they are all about a metre apart”.
“Then we also have fences and more road cones on the fences. It is annoying.”
The council’s infrastructure and open spaces group manager, Neil McCann, said health and safety around roadworks included a risk analysis and looks at "the worst case scenario”, McCann said.
The Walnut Ave area is deemed high risk, he said
Cameron countered that, suggesting the wall of road cones was making it a higher risk because there is no parking and “college students are taking risks with their driving because it’s all road cones”.
“It’s possibly road cone mania gone bonkers.”
The work on Walnut Avenue to put in a new kerb and channel along the length of the Ashburton Domain was scheduled to be completed by now.
McCann said the winter weather was causing delays as the timing for the work was less than ideal.
“We had the money available and wanted to do it using subsidised money before the end of the last year, so we just had to get it going to utilise that money.
“It wasn’t the best time of year admittedly, and unfortunately we have been caught out with rain that has delayed the work.”
Ashburton mayor Neil Brown said tenders needed to go out earlier to avoid any repeats as the roading programme has traditionally viewed March as the most appropriate sealing time.
The tender for this year’s roading programme is already under way, McCann said.
We're talking new year resolutions...
Tidying the house before going to bed each night, meditating upon waking or taking the stairs at work.
What’s something quick, or easy, that you started doing that made a major positive change in your life?
⚠️ DOGS DIE IN HOT CARS. If you love them, don't leave them. ⚠️
It's a message we share time and time again, and this year, we're calling on you to help us spread that message further.
Did you know that calls to SPCA about dogs left inside hot cars made up a whopping 11% of all welfare calls last summer? This is a completely preventable issue, and one which is causing hundreds of dogs (often loved pets) to suffer.
Here are some quick facts to share with the dog owners in your life:
👉 The temperature inside a car can heat to over 50°C in less than 15 minutes.
👉 Parking in the shade and cracking windows does little to help on a warm day. Dogs rely on panting to keep cool, which they can't do in a hot car.
👉 This puts dogs at a high risk of heatstroke - a serious condition for dogs, with a mortality rate between 39%-50%.
👉 It is an offence under the Animal Welfare Act to leave a dog in a hot vehicle if they are showing signs of heat stress. You can be fined, and prosecuted.
SPCA has created downloadable resources to help you spread the message even further. Posters, a flyer, and a social media tile can be downloaded from our website here: www.spca.nz...
We encourage you to use these - and ask your local businesses to display the posters if they can. Flyers can be kept in your car and handed out as needed.
This is a community problem, and one we cannot solve alone. Help us to prevent more tragedies this summer by sharing this post.
On behalf of the animals - thank you ❤️
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