Sacred Ground
Sue Brooks January 13th, 2015
Does every community have a place it calls sacred? I know that religious people consider their meeting buildings sacred. Churches have always been considered sacred and a place of refuge for Christians and non Christians alike. Our nations first people have places they deem sacred and prefer to preserve these places still in spite of our presence here.
To me, nature has always provided my sacred places. The wet tropics of North Queensland, the Dandenongs in Victoria and Lady Elliott Island easily spring to mind to name but a few. But here in Hervey Bay my very, very sacred place is our foreshore.
Like others before me, I adore our peaceful beaches and naturally vegetated foreshore. I treasure the planners of the past who have kept development to the South of that beautiful road we call the Esplanade or ‘Nard.
Like Noosa to the South, we have developed an envied reputation for our low rise relaxed ambience.
Our city foreshore has it all. Clean sands, winding pathways, shops and houses blended together connecting in a long, long line from Urangan to Pt Vernon’s very tip and around… We have no mud there. We have corals and rock pools and all manner of marine life. We have jetties and a beautiful long pier from which to fish or wander.
So why am I forever worried that we will lose what we all enjoy? I am worried because this Council we elected to do good things for us seems intent on destroying this our sacred ground.
Today I received a short message. It seems Council is deciding whereabouts on the foreshore at Scarness, to place a fast food vendor. Really Council! Don’t you realise we don’t want or need commercial development there. The shops at Scarness are doing it tough. We have Enzo’s and while we want development we don’t want a 2 storey Enzo’s. We all enjoy the much approved Beach House Hotel. I was over the moon when this development went ahead as low rise not the 8 storey monster Council had approved previously.
So please, please, please Council look after our sacred ground. Leave it be. Don’t commercialise it and do not destroy our caravan parks either. It is rumoured that these wonderful caravan parks are next on your hit list. Stay away. Enough is enough.
We do enjoy improved views of the water but we don’t want these views spoiled by foreshore erosion, loss of shady trees or commercial buildings. Our foreshore is sacred and those of us that have settled here from other places far away, for those that were here before us and for those that will come after us please, please don’t destroy our sacred place.
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Agree; except for “the much approved Beach House Hotel”: Look no further than the hotel recently opened at Coolum – in a position not unlike that occupied by the BH – to see what might have been achieved here. Instead we have a low-rise monster that is blind to its beautiful surroundings. What a pity!