COUNCIL’S general manager Warwick Bennett hopes to turn the Oallen Ford bridge ‘debacle’ into a positive.
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At Tuesday’s council meeting, he outlined plans aiming to keep a proposed new bridge for the Shoalhaven crossing mainly on the road reserve. This way, the structure would not impinge on an Aboriginal land claim.
The solution came less than two weeks after work on the $2.6 million project was suspended.
Council discovered that the concrete structure sat partly on land subject to an Aboriginal claim.
Senior engineering director Terry Cooper was stood down after the discovery. Contractors, CivilBuild have also redeployed staff until work can start.
Mr Bennett has been reviewing the matter and consulting with staff since.
“When I found out that the bridge wasn’t on the road reserve, I thought it was an opportunity to get a better solution for the community,” he told the Post.
The changes try as much as possible to restrict the bridge to the road reserve. Mr Bennett will also negotiate to lift the structure a further metre (to three metres) above the water, ensuring greater flood protection for the often inundated crossing.
“Dangerous” hairpin bends on the approaches would also be removed.
However the bridge’s battering, or side slopes, could still impinge on the land claim. Mr Bennett is seeking to reduce the slope to 33 degrees, rather than 45 degrees, to allow more environmental planting.
“I’m not confident we can retain everything on the road reserve but I am confident we can minimise the impact on the adjacent Crown land that is subject to the claim. That is my goal,” he said.
All of the changes are subject to negotiation with the contractors and the Pejar and Ulladulla Aboriginal Land Councils.
Mr Bennett had not been updated on the claim’s progress.
He confirmed that the Pejar Council was consulted as part of the development application for the bridge. Cr Alf Walker is chairman of that organisation.
“They gave us a brief letter at the time saying that they had no concerns but I’m not sure they were aware that the bridge was not on the road reserve,” Mr Bennett said.
He believed a staff member rather than Cr Walker had handled the correspondence.
Mr Bennett plans to report back to Council in three weeks on design options and costs.
“There are a number of options and I’m really hopeful we can keep as much of it on the road reserve as possible without impacting on the Aboriginal land claim, which would be a win-win for everyone,” he said.
The GM told the meeting that CivilBuild had been extremely helpful in agreeing to redeploy workers to other projects, thus reducing Council’s exposure to additional costs.
Mr Bennett again apologised for the mistake, repeating his earlier assertion it was a “schoolboy error.”
“But it has occurred, we have to move forward and we hope to come out with a better result…It does have a silver lining.”
The solution won widespread praise from councillors.
“You have handled it professionally,” Cr Margaret O’Neill said.
Cr Robin Saville said the position Council found itself in was “not pleasant” but commended Mr Bennett’s management.
“I was literally stunned when I was called into the (councillor) workshop and told about this,” he said.
“It’s very important that such a mistake never happens again.”
Mayor Geoff Kettle revealed that he had met with Roads Minister Duncan Gay in Sydney to ensure that state funding for the project would still be available.
“It is a shocking sequence of events and it must never happen again. I know that what has been put in place will bring such things to a stop and there will be very strong policing of Council tenders in future,” he said.