An offer by contractors and farmers to give time and equipment to build a new road to the Oamaru harbour is being pursued by the Waitaki District Council.
The offer was made to the council in May by former Waitaki Mayor Alan McLay and businessmen Doug Hurst and Les McCullough.
Their plan was to build a new road from the end of Wansbeck St on the western side of land fronting Marine Pde.
It would go through the former Te Mahi Trust site to link with Marine Parade.
It was an alternative to the first stage of redeveloping the harbour by building a new road at a cost of $300,000 from the end of Wansbeck St linking directly into Marine Pde - a proposal opposed by some people for safety reasons.
The second stage was to build a new road across former railway goods yard land to link in with Waterfront Rd.
That would cost $900,000.
The chairman of the council's harbour and heritage sub-committee, Gary Kircher, said the offer had been discussed with the three proponents at a meeting with council staff and the council was looking into the technical aspects of the proposal.
Once that was done, it would discuss with Land Transport NZ transferring a road subsidy of $180,000 for the $300,000 stage 1 proposal to the new road proposed by the community.
"There is general agreement on the sub-committee to progress the proposal further," Mr Kircher said.
The council has already allocated about $150,000 to the stage 1 road.
Mr McLay said, with the help of contractors and farmers donating equipment and labour, their proposed road could be built at no extra cost to the council.
