My wife was a kind and caring soul. All she wanted was peace
I refer to Paul Weston’s column in the 15th June Gold Coast Bulletin entitled “How a crusader was crushed by hell road”.
Paul’s kind words regarding my beloved partner, Sue Elliott, were much appreciated, as was his understanding of Sue’s suffering during her final year of life. If only someone involved in the construction of the Southport-Burleigh Road Upgrade had exhibited similar compassion.
It is widely recognised, both internationally and within Australia, that night noise levels above 40dB lead to sleep disturbance/ deprivation and that sleep is a biological necessity for good health. It is also universally acknowledged that sleep disturbance/ deprivation is always debilitating and can, in extreme cases, promote or exacerbate chronic disease such as cancer. And yet night after night for more than 12 months Sue and I, together with numerous other local residents, were subjected to appalling levels of noise whilst the Bundall Road was widened through Sorrento.
TMR would respond to complaints with statements on local news channels to the effect of “noise levels are regularly monitored and no breaches in the Code of Practice Guidelines for this project have been identified” which clearly implies that noise levels were kept within acceptable limits. But it actually meant that TMR, on behalf of the Queensland Government, had agreed a Noise and Vibration Management Plan (NVMP) with their Contractor allowing them to make as much noise as they wanted and that on-going measurement showed them to be doing exactly that!
People will not believe this – I didn’t – but it is absolutely true and the NVMP/monitoring results are even now shrouded in secrecy, allegedly unavailable because they are “commercial in confidence”. Utter rot – the information is being hidden because the truth is unpalatable. As is the fact that TMR and their Contractor, Georgiou, had absolute control over the levels of noise emitted - the Council had no jurisdiction, the Police had no jurisdiction and the Environmental Protection Agency, who will go bat-shit crazy if a tree frog is disturbed and according to their remit should also be concerned with noise pollution, considered road widening to be “maintenance” and therefore denied jurisdiction. In short then, TMR and their Contractor were judge, jury and executioner when it came to road noise.
I say that it is time for TMR to relinquish their omnipotence in this matter and I call upon whoever has a legal right to access the noise level information, be it the Queensland Government, TMR or their Contractor, Georgiou, to release the NVMP and the results from the monitoring station located in Gladys Moncrieff Park so that the truth may be known and that lessons can be learnt from this bitter experience.
I have, for the purpose of this letter, deliberately avoided mention of the personal abuse Sue was subjected to in response to her complaints about the noise. It is simply too painful so soon after her death to recall her being manhandled by armed police for being on the public footpath in the early hours of the morning or being trolled online.
Sue was a typical Aussie girl, honest and forthright and she stood up for her rights, but at heart she was a kind and caring soul and all she wanted was some peace. Is this too much to ask in modern day Australia?
When Sue first saw her oncologist in early February he thought it most likely she had developed secondary breast cancer and he felt this would be relatively easy to bring under control. After lying dormant for 26 years, he expected the cancer would be slow to progress. But instead it proved to be extremely aggressive (she died 10 weeks later), thereby causing the oncologist to believe some other factor was in play. A year of sleep deprivation and insufferable stress as a result of roadworks noise perhaps?