Mr & Mrs Geoffrey & Angela Still Physical: 77b Viv Davie-Martin Drive, RD 4, Warkworth 0984 Email: Presentation: Puhoi to Wellsford Road of National Significance: Puhoi to Warkworth Section Mr Chairman & members of the board, I am Angela Still, I am here to present on behalf of myself & Geoff Still. Our family lives at 77b Viv Davie-Martin Drive, Warkworth. We are east of the proposed alignment as it heads north & then south of the alignment as it heads east to join the existing State Highway 1, as the crows flies our north western boundary is 130 metres from the designation. Our home is within 200 metres of the designation. This Board Room is certainly not my natural environment, nor do I really even want to be here, it is only because we believe the negative impact to our lives to be so significant, so distressing, that we are here. We Oppose in Full the Proposal to build a new motorway from Puhoi to Warkworth Our opposition is on two levels: Firstly on a basic level, our reasons are as per our submission and raised again in our list of contested issues. We understand we have to rely on the Board of Enquiry to judge the project on its economic benefits, whether the NZTA have considered correctly the alternatives and whether the proposed alignment is the best option available to meet the objectives. Having said that I draw your attention to the two included photos, these are of the beautiful if wet & sometimes foggy va lley north of our property. I’d like to just ask if constructing a motorway through a known flood plain & sometime fog bound gully is the best alternative. This proposal is a Road of National Significance, Mr Chairman; you made it clear at the pre hearing conference, that was not open to debate. Which means there is no point in me addressing urban sprawl, climate change, peak fuel or other more fundamental issues. Since I am not a traffic engineer, town planner, geologist, ecologist, entomologist, economist nor an acoustic engineer my presentation today is more specifically about the personal significant negative impacts the proposed designation will have on our family. Geoff, my husband, grew up in Warkworth attending both Warkworth Primary & Mahurangi College, I grew up on Auckland’s North Shore. Our first home in 1989 , was on Auckland’s Penrose Road. Although this allowed proximity to employment in Auckland we found the traffic noise, vibration & pollution unacceptable to us. We moved to Botany Downs in 1996, however there was further development of Ti Rakau Drive and the Eastern Arterial Route was reintroduced as an option for Auckland, the designation was already in place and so rather than stay to wait and see what happened we purchased land in Warkworth in 1994, well out of town, a quiet, peaceful lifestyle block. We made the move to create a quality Geoffrey & Angela Still “Puhoi” Page: 1
lifestyle environment for our family, by making sacrifices – financial and social, we have created our home and land and a rural lifestyle for our family. We moved to get away from the noise, dirt and intense activity of urban living, to avoid the consultation, disruption & general distress that having a major roading project go in somewhere near us would cause. The additional irony of our situation is that the Eastern Arterial route was never constructed and here we are having our lives wrecked by this proposal. You will appreciate then that we feel somewhat hunted, victimised and ripped off with this current designation being proposed for our back yard which means the loss of being able to enjoy a rural lifestyle and outlook, having to return to an urban environment, noise, pollution and all that it entails. Planning restrictions were imposed to ensure the rural outlook of the area was maintained, yet an enormous ugly four lane motorway will wreck the view. Our approach to our property has been to develop it in a self sustaining, environmentally sensitive way, we have established native plant areas, to encourage bird life. We are self sufficient in water, sewage, semi self self sufficient for food. So we have lived on and by main and busy roads. We have experienced first hand the rubbish they generate... The noise, the dust, the ugly, the vibration and the light and I am confident we will not acclimatise to the new environment NZTA brings to our property. It is not possible to quantify the distress and sense of loss caused by the permanent disruption the construction & operation this proposal ahs already caused & will continue to. Some of this stress is because by being a Road OF National Significance the process has had reduced timing. We all know this application is being fast tracked. You will know that submissions closed on the 13th of December, Patrick Kelly rung to acknowledge the submission and said they would be back in touch. Other than a response to a direct question it was the 13th of February that I heard from Murray Wallis. It is a busy time of year and I know people go on holidays, so do the NZTA therefore I am sceptical of the NZTA’s choice of timing. While I am commenting on that part of our experience, Murray ’s call was to discuss having a facilitated meeting. We responded in the positive & gave three times of the week we were able to meet. A meeting for Viv Davie Martin Drive residents was proposed mid March for a meeting on the 25th of March; we were unable to attend but we have noted that the meetings haven’t seen much progress in settling our objections. We have been engaged in the consultation process having attended open days & had several meetings with NZTA to be as informed as possible, while NZTA rely on the science & the standards, there has been no concession to our situation. We can tell the board that we have put in hundreds of hours in reading, meeting, discussing, downloading and trying to understand the massive amount of information, putting together feedback, our submission and now this presentation. Over the last few years we have taken time off work and away from our busy family life to try to protect our family. And this is to put our case against an organisation which has hundreds of people putting in thousands of hours with unlimited resources. An example of this gross imbalance in power is we had thought to provide an expert noise witness. It became clear such an endeavour would be Geoffrey & Angela Still “Puhoi” Page: 2
outside our financial resources; seemingly it would be several thousand dollars just to get the report desk reviewed. The Assessment of Environment Effects section 26 states “For some near neighbours the changes in environmental amenity will be noticeable, especially during the first few years of operation. These effects will lessen for some neighbours after a period of adjustment” This does not accurately reflect the degree of stress that the process of this application has caused. The effects on individually affected persons are understated. These are more than “minor adverse”. It is very upsetting to know that you really are powerless when dealing with the NZTA; we believe they hide behind the Public Works Act, NZ standards and the plethora of reports. We feel we are just collateral damage. Our family have gone through a range of emotions as we have dealt with this situation, everything from anger, frustration, bitterness and grievance. Many tears and sleepless nights have resulted. Of course not everyone is dealing with issues at the same stage as they come to terms with it so we end up with inter-family tensions which put stress on relationships. The past four years have been very unsettling. We are trying to base life altering decisions on a project that has not been sufficiently substantiated, has vague conditions and is still to be left open for what the NZTA call “ innovative design”, we call it “wanting your cake & eating it”. It is our belief that for us these effects will not lessen and we are left with a much reduced quality of life. So then if the nation is to benefit from it the nation can take care to protect our property and our interests. I would like to address issues raised in our submission that require further explanation or comment on points raised during the evidence lodged, rebuttal evidence, cross examination or in other representations. 1. Landscape and Visual: The undulating topography means that a large number of homes will loose what is currently a rural outlook to one off traffic, asphalt, bridges and other concrete structures required for extensive cuts & fills. We can not currently see the intersection of Carren Rd & Woodcocks Rd, the site of the Woodcocks Road viaduct as it is surrounded by bush. There has not been a visual simulation done to show us what it may look like from our property. Several times we have been given the “Until the developed design” line which creates uncertainty for us. When Murray Ellis & Robert Pryor visited our property they commented that they weren’t really sure what we would see and suggested we could “just plant some more trees”, yes we could and yes that would provide screening, but it would also impact on our neighbour’s Geoffrey & Angela Still “Puhoi” Page: 3
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