Round two for say on transport plan

CITY of Ballarat is calling for feedback on the recently released Ballarat Walking and Pedestrian Network Discussion Paper, part of the municipality’s Integrated Transport Plan.

The need for overall transport plan has been a council priority for some time now, James Guy, City of Ballart Acting Development and Planning Director said.

“The main reason [for the plan] is we have to advocate for the things we don’t own, the investments that benefit the city such as railways, major roads, and highways are State and Federal government funded,” he said.

“We want to engage with the community to get a really good sense of the priorities for Ballarat that we need to be both doing ourselves and advocating for.”

Australian Bureau of Statistics 2016 Census data reveals 3.3 per cent of people who travel to work in Ballarat walk.

While the council considers walking as a mode of transport is low within the city, it believes community engagement will help it come up with specific ways to raise the rate of pedestrian travel.

“We are after two things, at the higher level we are trying to test the priorities that people have, we hear a lot about a lack of footpaths can be a barrier but some of the greater barriers are really busy roads that you can’t easily cross,” Mr Guy said.

“What we are trying to weigh up, with a relatively limited budget that we have, is where do we spend to have the most benefit.

“On the website people can drop pins on a map saying this is a particularly difficult area and I would like to see this happen.”

The council spends approximately $700,000 a year on constructing new footpaths while private developers are required to build footpaths within new housing estates.

“What we are saying is that we couldn’t just build everywhere to complete every path in every area, although we would love to, so we need to be smart about how we do it,” Mr Guy said.

“So, once we have the outcomes [of the community input to the discussion paper] we will have a really clear way to prioritise the very valid requests we get.”

The City’s travel plan includes rail, pedestrian, bus and tram, aviation and vehicle methods of travel within the municipality.

Council received 230 community responses to the railway network discussion paper launched in June.

“That was a fantastic response, we were really pleased about that, now we are waiting to see what we get about walking,” Mr Guy said.

A draft of the Ballarat Integrated Transport Action Plan will be released after community feedback from all five discussion papers is received later this year, with the final version of the plan due early in 2020.

Go to mysay.ballarat.vic.gov.au to make suggestions on the Walking and Pedestrian Network Discussion Papers.