Road upgrade case ready next month

Rachel Brown.
Rachel Brown.
A business case on the best option for upgrading Wanaka's Ballantyne Rd will be presented to the Wanaka Community Board next month.

Queenstown Lakes District Council staff were originally expected to present options for upgrading the road to the community board at its first full meeting today. Instead a business case will be presented at next month's community board meeting.

In March, the board hosted a public meeting to discuss concerns residents had after there were five accidents on the road in the space of six weeks.

Following the public meeting, board members attended a workshop and asked council staff to produce a report on the best options for upgrading the road.

Community board chairwoman Rachel Brown said council staff, including chief executive Mike Theelen, had looked at the issue and decided a full business case was needed.

Ms Brown said she understood residents wanted to see something done urgently but a business case meant the best possible option would be found.

''What we will have is a range of different options from what the maximum the council could do to what the minimum would be and from that we can get the best outcome for everybody.''

Some of the options would be costly so it was important the council was able to look at all the different options, she said.

Last month Ballantyne Rd resident John Coers wrote to the council asking for urgent action to be taken in upgrading the road.

If a sensible outcome came from the council's business case, the time it took was not such an issue, he said.

He was pleased the council had appeared to become more involved with the issue in the past few weeks.

Mr Coers said he did not expect a suitable outcome but would be happy to be proved wrong.

tim.miller@odt.co.nz

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