Community & Business
10 April, 2024
Gravel for road request rejected
A TOPAZ property owner is still waiting for some gravel for 600m of Union Road which is virtually impassable in soggy conditions.
Scott MacLeod has been pleading with council to put some gravel on the road and despite gravel being laid on a section of Union Road recently, the last 600m to his property remains a grassed thoroughfare that looks more like a walking track.
He says he has had multiple accidents because of the road over the past few years and has also raised concerns that emergency vehicles would not be able to access his property or the other property along that last section of the road during wet weather.
He also claims that a Tablelands Regional Council staffer sent him a text recently when she could not access his property to alert him to a dead horse near his gate.
“Hi Scott, we have come to the end of the formed road. I am not comfortable driving on the grass road any further in this weather, are you at your property?” the text stated.
Mayor Rod Marti visited Mr MacLeod last year but he was not able to provide any assistance.
Mr MacLeod has also received an email from Cr Dave Bilney in the past, advising him that the road was considered to be “unformed” and as such, had not been receiving any annual maintenance other than slashing of vegetation beside the road if required.
Mr MacLeod is not the first property owner to complain about the road, with previous owner Diane Metcalfe sending letters to request gravel back as far as 2000 to Eacham Shire Council.
On behalf of Mr MacLeod, The Express again asked Tablelands Regional Council if he could expect any assistance in the near future.
But a spokesperson said: “We won’t be answering the questions about Union Road as we have previously provided information on this, and responded to Mr MacLeod on several occasions.”
Last August, TRC’s Infrastructure and Environment general manager Mark Vis advised that council determined its levels of service for roads via a star rating system which used data such as traffic volume and road function, to establish the desired standard of each road in the shire.
“This section of Union Road has a star rating of 1.21 and is a natural surface road. The current state of this section of the road generally meets the desired standard,” he said.
