Traffic management needs to be managed
Safety and convenience are not synonyms, yet much of the road closure and other traffic management activity that is currently occurring around Dunedin is more about convenience for the contractor than safety.
The recent rule changes for temporary traffic management (TTM) have opened up a loophole for contractors to exploit. Slap a ‘‘safety’’ label on it and you can get away with a multitude of sins that provide convenience for the contractor. This includes denying residents the right to access their street.
There may be occasional brief periods each day when restricting resident access can be justified on safety grounds, but for the majority of the day access for residents of Glenross St could be safely made available.
All it would require is a degree of willingness and common decency to be shown by the contractor and the contract principal. But it is inconvenient for these parties to show this willingness, so TTM regulations are used to avoid doing the right thing.
The TTM regulations bestow enormous rights to close down roads, but with rights always come responsibilities.
Contractors, contract principals and the road controlling authorities (who rubber-stamp the TTM plans) are forgetting about their responsibilities.
Gordon Fraser
Waverley
For shame
The old New Zealand shame continues. Why treat someone for $40k when we can instead pay $110k to the same person while sitting on ACC?
The procedure is small and non-complex, the national shame is large, the cost to the taxpayer is also equal. How many billions of health dollars are spent on this waste, instead of treatment, the training of health professionals and hospitals; let alone the cost to individuals and their families?
Brett Smith
Waikouaiti
Litter bugs
Please, please can something be done about the litter on Three Mile Hill.
I had occasion last month to contact the Dunedin City Council about a whole rubbish bag of trash that had been dumped in one of the lay-bys and they reacted very promptly in clearing it up, but did nothing about the rest of the rubbish I reported lying on both sides of the road.
It is now really bad and starts on the Mosgiel side.
Both sides of the road are continual dumping grounds all the way to the top to nearly at Dalziel Rd. The pull-ins are all strewn with cans, bottles, paper and other rubbish and the entry gates to the forest look terrible with stuff everywhere.
It is such a lovely route to enter our city by and must look awful to the tourists who travel that way. I don’t understand why people should litter in this manner.
Carol Tippett
Mosgiel
Confusing hype
I am intrigued by all of the hype surrounding the proposal to establish an AI computer base in Southland. The name AI is an abbreviation of Artificial and Intelligence. Surely one of the greatest oxymorons in use today.
It will require incredible amounts of electricity, so perhaps the experts should start developing ‘‘AE’’. Look that up using AI. It’s not there yet but it will mean Artificial Electricity. That is what will be required given the amount of time taken in this country to get approval, let alone build, anything capable of providing the amount of electricity needed.
Perhaps they are planning on using AI to produce a roster for every citizen to switch off all electrical components for half a day on a regular basis. This roster should start with the businesses and homes of the people who are pushing the proposal.
Bob Farrell
Arrowtown
Moving to a ‘build it and they will pay’ model
I am somewhat surprised to read in the ODT today (13.3.26) that Dunedin Venues Management Ltd chief executive Paul Doorn is upbeat and convinced that he and his team can do better in 2026 so shortly before Christchurch is opening the new Te Kaha Stadium.
He is not the first stadium boss to have tried and failed since the beginning of this saga, and while costs are steadily mounting, all of us have fewer dollars to spend. Like his predecessors, Mr Doorn will quietly leave one day.
It was obvious to some of us at the time that this stadium idea would never fly (build it and they will come). I am now more convinced than ever that Victor Billot's statement in the very same article is, sadly, the more likely scenario. ‘‘Build it and they'll have to pay’’ is the more correct slogan in 2026 and beyond.
U Uchida
West Harbour
Clarity needed on Iran attack positioning
At the outset of the US-Israel attack on Iran, it was incredible that our government couldn't or wouldn't make a clear statement, citing lack of information, when surely it was available through New Zealand's membership of Five Eyes.
The history of the US eroding the sovereignty of Iran dates from 1953 when they arranged the overthrow of Iran's elected prime minister, one who had a policy to nationalise oil reserves. Sanctions, weapons of war, have been ruthlessly applied by the US against Iran for decades, culminating in the recent ‘‘cost of living’’ protests.
The US-Israel attack is justified as being ‘‘to prevent Iran from continuing to threaten international peace, security . . . [and] adherence to international law’’.
The primary irony is that the aggressive perpetrators are the most violent betrayers of international law.
Marie Venning
Christchurch
Monstrous behaviour
History is littered with monsters inflicting pain, suffering and death on innocent people.
It is devastating that after thousands of years humankind has yet to learn how to intervene and prevent these monsters from taking hold of countries to prevent sheer evil.
I also do not understand why people who have suffered at the hands of monsters then inflict pain, suffering and death on others.
Why can’t we learn from history and do better? Why can’t we take a wellbeing for all approach?
Sadly, that’s beyond the comprehension of monsters and their supporters whose greed and lust for power renders them unable to care about their fellow humans now and in the future.
Lou Scott
Kenmure
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