ONCE more Junction Court is in the headlines, again for all the wrong reasons.
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Several weeks after being opened to vehicular traffic, pedestrians are still confused about its purpose and the rules for crossing it – so much so, attendants in bright yellow vests have been hired to try to usher people to the traffic lights.
Alarmingly, there have been reports of near misses between cars and pedestrians. For Shoalhaven City Council, there are angry mutterings about a bad decision poorly executed – a decision that is costing money many believe would be better spent elsewhere.
Now the plan is to place chains between bollards, enact a 10km/h speed limit and install a speed hump in the middle of the shared zone, meaning that beautiful paving with the motif of the Shoalhaven River will have to be dug up again.
The problem is that Junction Court is neither fish nor fowl – not a real roadway and certainly no longer a pleasant place to sit and enjoy the sunshine. In fact, it’s not too much of stretch to call it a complete disaster.
Once those chains are installed, it will no longer be a pedestrian mall at all – rather, two footpaths divided by a very expensive roadway. And as for it activating that part of the CBD, there’s certainly no evidence of that happening whatsoever. In fact, the community events that brought life to the area now seem few and far between.
The antisocial behaviour the opening was supposed to have stopped pretty well ended with the removal of the raised grassed area and the commissioning of stage one without the traffic. So exactly what has been achieved by letting cars through – apart from major embarrassment for council – remains a complete mystery.