I HAVE the greatest appreciation and admiration for our present council and the administration staff who are the council’s backbone. I believe these people are motivated by a desire to act in the best interests of the people of the Macleay.
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They are pro-active and will lead and manage our shire into an ever-improving state.
I also know that it is counter-intuitive for people who live on an unsealed road to say they don’t want their road sealed. Ask the people on Pipers Creek Rd or the Maria River Rd. I’m sure that some people on the council are scratching their heads and wondering “why on earth would someone not want their road sealed?”
Nevertheless, the Plomer Rd is a rare exception to this rule. Most of the people who live on the Plomer Rd have made huge financial commitments to purchase their proprieties because, in part, of the fact that the road is unsealed.
Most people who live in the shire and visit Goolawah see the rustic, unsealed road as part of the ‘magic’ of living in this very special valley. Most, if not all, of the people who come to Goolawah for their holidays also see the rustic Plomer Rd as part of their ‘soft adventure’.
Many of them are now third and fourth generation holidayers. Why do they come and drive their city cars along this dusty road? Because they love it! Because Goolawah offers them something that has vanished from the rest of the coast.
In fact, the Plomer Rd, in its rustic state, is an intrinsic element of the tourist industry for Crescent Head. Seal the road and we make this strip of coast no different from nearly every other coastal holiday destination.
Interestingly, back in 2003, the Port News reported that “the National Trust of Australia has listed the Point Plomer Rd as a ‘rustic road’; on its annual list of Australia’s most endangered places because the local councils wanted to seal them. Sealing the roads, the National Trust says, would ruin historic landscape links to European settlement”.
Recently I posted on the Crescent Head Community Forum Facebook site a short film consisting of edited excerpts from a longer film made by Crescent Head local, Paul O’Donnell in 2003. Its subject is the ‘No Tar For Goolawah’ campaign that raged then. Less than three days later, at the time of writing, it had been shared by 6000 people. Such is the sensitivity of this subject.
I am an optimist. I believe that our council will listen and act accordingly. The message is loud and clear: ‘No Tar for Goolawah!’
