Grumblings from the Hills
Next time you head along South Dowling Street past the golf course and the edge of Moore Park, take a look at the thousands of new units on the old Navy and Reschs Brewery sites to your west and spare a thought for the residents of Surry Hills.
Why? The Eastern Distributor scotched any possibility of a light rail system on the old South Dowling Street tramlines, so green-minded residents of these splendid new developments must hop on a bike or a bus to get to the City.
Which bus? The ancient 301/2/3 service that lumbers up Bourke, Baptist and Crown Streets to Circular Quay – every 15 minutes if you foolishly believe the timetable; in reality often a 30-40 minute daytime wait. There was one every 20 minutes, usually on time, 25 years ago and they stopped at Central and Town Hall. Progress is a wondrous thing.
By the time they get to Surry Hills, they’re usually full. A cab driver’s paradise, Surry Hills….
Clover Moore is a local. She’s lived in Redfern almost as long as we’ve lived in Surry Hills. We’re not snobbish about the border – the Surry Hills Shopping Village is, after all, in Redfern. “Clover for Mayor!” we shouted in 2004, and she was elected.
Clover filled Redfern with trees – though not yet as magnificent as the century-old ones that line Bourke Street in Surry Hills.
We hoped Clover would get the buses fixed, but it looks as if that’s gone into the “too hard” basket. Instead, we find ourselves gazing incredulously at a glossy flier announcing that Council is introducing “a dedicated separated bicycle route along Bourke Street”, in competition with the nice new one a block away along the edge of Moore Park.
It’s a lovely flier, with a smashing tricked-up photo showing four traffic lanes where there are currently three, and a cross-section of a new 12.8-metre roadway with room for everybody. It makes no mention of the bike lanes that have run up and down Bourke Street for years, to everybody’s satisfaction.
That photo has popped up on cycling websites all around Australia, with “click here” buttons to email the council saying how great it will be to cycle up such a good-looking street.
Sadly for Council, one or two Surry Hills residents can read a plan and use a tape measure. The street in the background of the photograph is only about 11 metres wide. The plane trees and parking spaces in the background are, for the most part, marked for removal on draft plans approved last November by the council’s Sydney Traffic Committee.
Even the pedestrian refuge which eagle-eyed readers may spot in the scene (near the awkward corner of Bourke and Devonshire Streets) is scheduled to go.
Instead, a wiggly line of concrete dominoes is planned, allocating the west side of Bourke Street (trees, parking lanes and all) to that most infamous of cycling hazards – a snaky two-way cycle path on a hill.
We’re a six-bike family, although the kids find me rather slow – they won’t go near me if I’m wobbling uphill, certainly not on a path with a glass-filled gutter on one side and a wicked row of concrete blocks on the other.
I guess this white elephant will get steamrollered through as some sort of pseudo-Green election stunt. We’ll all continue to pedal up and down the main roadway, although presumably the existing bicycle lanes – one for uphill and one for down (why aren’t they painted green like they are in Bondi?) – will be sacrificed along with the trees and the parking.
It still beats waiting for a bus!
Richard Shuttleworth and his family are long-time Surry Hills residents and members of SENSE (Sensible Engineering for a New Sustainable Environment). They are not members of any of the many community groups campaigning against the ridiculous Bourke Street Cycle Road.
