TEN years after Port Stephens Council downed tools on the Gan Gan Road bike path Adrian Lewis is beyond annoyed.
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There’s a 200 metre gap in the middle where the Anna Bay and Boat Harbour paths were meant to meet.
Instead pedestrians and cyclists – including children – are forced onto Gan Gan Road in a 70 kmh section.
The retired teacher and tireless P&C volunteer lives at Boat Harbour and doubts his daughter, 11, will ever get to ride her bike to Anna Bay Public School.
“Everyone in Boat Harbour is just fed up with it,” Mr Lewis said.
“This project obviously fell off council’s priority list a long time ago.”
The council received $180,000 in April from the state government to complete 12 projects across the local government area.
The missing link was not among them. About that time a resident asked the council, on its Your Say websit,e where the project was up to and received the following reply:
“It is our plan to complete the path and it is recognised as a missing link. We applied for funding to complete the path in the 2016/17 financial year but were unsuccessful. Though it will not be completed anytime soon, it is part of our plan and we will continue to apply for funding for this path.”
A council spokesman told the Examiner the pathway was not on a priority list yet.
“This section of Gan Gan Road has been identified in the Pathways Plan, however, until the plan is adopted no priorities have been set,” he said.
“The adoption of this plan will improve council's ability to attract grant funding and also prioritises proposed works.”
Mr Lewis hopes that a pedestrian refuge or some kind of crossing is included, since the Boat Harbour path runs on the south side of the road while the Anna Bay section is on the northern side. The council spokesman declined to say if a crossing was part of any plan.
The spokesman did say that anyone wishing to request a speed zone change would need to contact Roads and Maritime Services directly.
“Council's Pathways Plan will be put forward for Councillors consideration at its meeting on May 24, on the back of requests from the community and an extensive public consultation process,” the spokesman said.
