ETTT Tree Policy, Cheltenham

We have just been told by a local resident that the ETTT tree-killers arrived at 7am this morning and continued their arboreal destruction in Cheltenham.  Did they choose early Saturday morning to avoid upsetting the sleep of residents, or to make it harder to muster objections?

HSC Tree Protection Policy

When asked about the two Blue Gum High Forest trees poisoned and then felled on 109 Copeland Rd, one of Hornsby Shire Council’s staff said: “it is a compliance matter... the tree has been poisoned; nothing more can be done."

So, if you want to have a tree removed you have a choice.  Apply for permission to the Council and pay their application fee $130, or buy a bottle of Roundup for $39.  What price a Tree Protection policy?

HSC's last chance to save Beecroft from Developers

Apparently before the auction of 109 Copeland Road last Saturday, the owner demolished the house and chopped down both poisoned trees! The police were called to keep the neighbours from lynching him.  Then the auction took place and the two cleared blocks sold for a total $2,380,000, a cool profit of $1,075,000 just for having the balls to do it and the gall to assume that even if the authorities took action any fine would be a trivial part of that obscene profit!
Come on Hornsby Shire Council, your electors are watching you!
(PMN - it transpires that HSC had in fact approved DAs that arguably permitted demolition of the house without public consultation!!  If so then the HSC needs to explain how such a thing can happen, granting a developer such a windfall profit)

If you don't know what this is about, I refer you to the main BCCT website, 2119.org.au, "recent submissions", "Poisoned trees at 109 Copeland Rd" of July 2012.

NWRL and the Disabled

The O'Farell Government says travellers will be better off with the metro style NWRL.  Even before the hypothetical second tunnel is built, they will travel in faster newer driverless trains for some of their journey which will surely compensate for having to change trains a few times.  Of course the new NWRL metro trains will have fewer seats, but does that matter?
Well, yes, Adam of the BCCT writes in to remind us.  Fit and healthy travellers can indeed run up and down and across platforms to catch the diverse trains involved in NWRL commuting.  But as Adam says, the aged, disabled (especially wheelchair dependent) and ill passengers from Beecroft, Cheltenham, Pennant Hills, Thornleigh and Normanhurst traveling to Sydney will have to catch three trains via the Epping to Chatswood rail link.  This has so far been ignored by the NWRL publicity machine.  Hopefully Ms Berejiklian will soon explain her intentions for these disadvantaged travellers.

NWRL - Second Sydney Harbour Tunnel

THE man in charge of the $8.3 billion North West Rail Link said he is building the line on the assumption a second Harbour rail crossing will follow and that Tube-like single-deck trains will then travel all through Sydney.     Transport for NSW's North West Rail Link project director Rodd Staples said his department was working on the concept of a second Harbour rail crossing - a tunnel from Chatswood through St Leonards and involving the creation of a new station at North Sydney. The director's comments show the dilemma facing Premier Barry O'Farrell because, although Transport Minister Gladys Berejiklian has stated she wants a second Harbour rail crossing, it is completely unfunded, would cost $10 billion to $15 billion and would likely require the sale of the $30 billion electricity poles and wires.

There is no plan, let alone a funded plan, for this second harbour tunnel.  When the O'Farrell party was elected into govenment it was on a promise to provide compatible train sets that could run from Rouse Hill to the city, sharing with North Shore and Northern Line trains to minimise customer inconvenience.  Since the election they changed to offering the Mickey Mouse train that can only reach the city after the hypothetical second harbour crossing is built.  Meanwhile commuters must change trains repeatedly to reach the city.