YOUR VIEWS

WRITE TO: P0 Box 1, Southport, 4215 EMAIL: letters@goldcoast.com.au FACEBOOK: facebook.com/goldcoastbulletin

THE light rail that has been built in Southport, Broadbeach etc has created nothing but dramas.

Criminals travel from Logan and come down to Surfers Paradise and rob and stab people, as has happened just recently.

Many businesses have gone bust through those areas.

I live on the southern Gold Coast because it’s a beautiful, peaceful part of Australia. If light rail comes that will be destroyed.

All you want is to catch it once a year to the airport. With the over development of units it will become a slum just like Southport and Surfers plus all the business that will go bust.

There is no more room around Currumbin on the skinny pathways for more pedestrian traffic.

The locals have a lovely spot there. Drive there and park, that’s fine, but we don’t want it turning into the ghetto like Surfers and Southport have become.

PAUL SULTANA, GOLD COAST

THREE quarters of Main Roads Minister Mark Bailey’s letter (GCB, July 30) can be easily explained.

Newman did not have any money. Bligh left the coffers bare.

He did not leave Queensland $100,000,000,000-plus in debt. Anything that Labor has achieved has been with borrowed dollars.

Maybe Mr Bailey can tell us why we pay so much interest, every day.

RICHARD GAGIE, ORMEAU

IN the midst of a worsening recesssion – debt through the roof and the dole queue stretching around the block – we need to decide what we can and cannot afford.

And to ask why we are forking out truckloads of cash to feel virtuous over the climate. High on the list of luxuries should be renewables – wind farms and solar panels.

B.A.E. Economics has put the cost of subsidies for this nonsense at $2.95 billion per year. That’s right, $2.95 billion. All of which could be spent on schools, hospitals,

roads – to say nothing of fighting the current virus.

This figure has never been challenged by the zealots. Hardly surprising, since they would prefer to avoid anything so vulgar as money, not when there’s a target to meet and the planet to be saved.

It gets worse. Unable to win in the court of public opinion, they are now calling for doubters and “deniers” to be sent to prison.

In Britain a group of university professors are advocating fines and jail for anyone publishing “climate misinformation.”

Nothing like silencing those who dare to disagree.

And in the United States, Joe Biden, likely be the next president, wants to usher in the Brave New World of “climate justice” by laying out two trillion dollars of other people’s money.

Biden has pledged emissionsfree electricity by 2035, with zero emissions by 2050. This would mean dumping oil, gas and coal inside 30 years.

No mention of the cost, as he presides over the wreckage of the American economy. And so the farce continues.

PC WILSON, MIAMI

A $4000 slap on the wrist is not enough for the two teenagers who brought COVID-19 into southeast Queensland (GCB, July 30).

Let’s hope more will come of this as they have potentially spread the virus on several fronts. Their selfishness and arrogance, as well as their lying to authorities, are despicable.

Perhaps stricter measures are essential at our domestic terminals.

These two definitely deserve a stint behind bars for possession of a lethal weapon.

KEN JOHNSTON, ROCHEDALE SOUTH

I FOR one think that the light rail should go through Palm Beach following the original plan. People must realise that the Gold Coast is

no longer a sleepy little surf village but a mayor tourist attraction.

The tourist dollars range in the billions and we need a transit system to cope with the visitors as well as moving our permanent residents to work and play.

We cannot keep building more roads as the volume just increases.

One only has to look at Los Angeles in California to see the gridlock it has – been there experienced that.

Having lived in Vancouver for many years, I witnessed the progression of public transport and how it opened up the areas that were once deemed to hard to get to years ago.

I have lived on the Gold Coast for the past 30 years so I have seen how we have grown. Get your heads out of the sand you selfish knockers and get on the train.

NORM FORD, GOLD COAST

AUSTRALIANS are in for one hell of a time getting Humpty Dumpy back together again when COVID-19 can be finally buried.

One can only hope those we have elected will bury their differences for the common good of “all” Australians – which should be of concern if some of the pettiness now doing the rounds is any indication.

We are in for one hell of a ride.

DALLAS FRASER, CURRUMBIN

UNTIL yesterday (Tuesday) l was giving our Queensland Premier a mere nine out of 10 for stoicism. Today she is so close to 10 out of 10.

DAVID HALL COOMBABAH

WHEN is a protest about light rail (LR) not about light rail? The answer ... When it’s about over-development.

The key word here is ‘over’ as opposed to ‘any’ development.

There’s no doubt the LR has brought a lot of development with it and much has involved relaxations of the City Plan allowing some buildings to exceed limits

making them much taller or bulkier than previously would have been allowed.

As a result, it seems you can’t have LR without an explosion in building applications, many of which get the nod even before sections of the route have been fully decided.

It’s quite possible, therefore, that developers who took advantage of the relaxations have built in areas where the LR is proposed but may find they’re not on the route at all. Given recent discussions about alternative routes, this could happen although many believe it’s unlikely to change.

This would be cold comfort for those who objected to the size, structure or impact on the local amenity of new buildings in their neighbourhood.

A recent letter to this page that was in favour of the LR seemed to brush off the fact that many buildings didn’t comply with the City Plan and, of course, there’s also discussions about how the City Plan should be updated.

In the meantime, it still exists and is meant to allow residents a chance to have their say on development.

Recently in Palm Beach, more than 100 residents took the time to write formal submissions to protest about a new development. There were no submissions in support and yet approval was given.

People feel they’re not being listened to and the debate has become polarized. The question of light rail and high density development has become one and the same thing.

Ironically, there would be many who would welcome improved public transport but this discussion has got bogged down with a ‘Light Rail or nothing’ attitude.

The issue of appropriate development for our growing community is important and deserves consideration without LR getting in the way.

YVETTE DEMPSEY, CARRARA