NSW Labor Government   

In 2002, two Ministers of the NSW Labor Government called on Ryde City Council to listen to the people.

One of those Ministers wrote to Ryde Council, informing it... "that it has to clarify all traffic and transport implications before any rezoning would be considered. Council will have to work co-operatively with RTA, State Transit Authority and Department of Planning if it is to progress plans for Top Ryde..."

The other Minister also wrote to Ryde Council, reminding it "... of its responsibilities to communicate properly with residents before any decisions are made regarding long-term plans for Top Ryde..."

The intervention by the above two Ministers during October 2002 was heartening, if genuine. But it remains to be seen, though, whether such intervention will have any real or substantive influence on slowing down the rampant over development.

Prima facie, Ryde Council will now hardly likely be able to bulldozer through, regardless, as it appeared to do so prior to the two Ministers' intervention. Ryde Council now has no other option but to address and implement the residents' concerns and objections, as outlined below.

But developers usually have to pay fees to Councils in order to develop properties.

Residents' Action Groups   

Already a number of Residents' Action Groups have sprung up in the Ryde district, obviously sick and tired of being throttled by the arrogance of Ryde City Council.

Some residents may feel that their Human Rights might be under threat.

The contact details of these Groups will be published here in due course.

Concerns And Objections   

The list of major concerns and objections include the following:

1. A massive shopping complex is being planned adjacent to the Ryde Primary School, adjacent to where innocent little kiddies go to school and play.
   
   
2. The lives and limbs of schoolchildren will be at risk, as a result of all the increased car traffic. Will the mothers and the fathers of these children agree to tolerate all these dangers? In the knowledge that one of their beloved little kiddies might just suddenly dart onto the road and perhaps be maimed or killed?
   
   
3. The above plan has been passed off as being in the nature of a benign, quaint European style village complex when, in reality, it is factually a major multi storey high density development complex. It is unmitigated over development.
   
   
4. A monopoly commercial centre is proposed to be created, whereby small businesses will probably need to pay high rents, which will then need to be passed on to shoppers by way of higher retail prices for goods and services. Many of these shoppers are pensioners, elderly, and sick. 
   
   
5. The adverse consequences of the above plan are being ignored or are being downplayed, especially the near certainty that drug pushers and other criminal gangs will be attracted to the area.
   
   
6. Ryde City Council proposes to increase the inhabitants of Top Ryde from 7,000 to about 14,000, thereby doubling the population. Top Ryde is already heavily congested with a lot of high rise Units, traffic, and off street parking.
   
   
7. If the population of Top Ryde is increased to 14,000, then more schools and more classrooms need to be built. A new hospital and more wards need to be built. More nursing homes need to be built. More transport infrastructure needs to be put in place. And so on. The list goes on, and on.
   
   
8. Ryde City Council seems unsympathetic to people losing market value of their property, quality of living, and suffering other detriments.
   
   
9. The area near Smith Street, Buffalo Road, and Lane Cove Road is already heavily congested with traffic and off street parking, as a result of the major development of the Top Ryde Shopping Centre that occurred about 10 years ago. The above plan will make all this even worse.
   
   
10. Top Ryde is situated on a relatively small geographical area, with narrow streets. It is also a major crossroads area, having enormous arterial traffic flows from north to south (Concord Road - Devlin Street/Blaxland Road/Lane Cove Road); and from east to west (all along Victoria Road - City to Parramatta and beyond); and the reverse, and also via all the side streets, many of which have numerous speed humps. The current heavy traffic is bad enough already. Putting more people and cars and buildings on existing facilities at Top Ryde, at this major crossroads, would create a huge bottleneck and a logjam, not just solely for Ryde, but also for the whole of Sydney as well. This would be on top of the increased traffic flow arising from the recent over development near Meadowbank, that in time will no doubt choke traffic along Concord Road.
    
    
11. There seems to be an absence of substantive considerations of any transitional arrangements. If the Top Ryde shopping centre is pulled down, then where are all the existing people going to do their shopping? And what about all the pensioners and the elderly and the sick people in the district who simply walk up to the Top Ryde shops in order to buy their groceries and their other basic necessities? I think that the rapid embrace of the developers' plans and of the spurning of the needs of the existing community, especially those of the pensioners and of the sick and of the elderly residents, are particularly deplorable and scandalous. These people have implicitly placed their trust in the public servants to do the right thing by them.
    
    
12. Again, if the Top Ryde shopping centre is pulled down, will all the existing small businesses be able to survive the loss of earnings during the construction period of approximately 1-2 years? Many, if not most of them, will undoubtedly suffer huge losses; some will probably simply go out of business; and some will probably go bankrupt, or nearly so. Not very nice, eh?    
    
    
13. Ryde City Council also proposes to redefine what "storey" will mean, which will result in the people of Ryde being materially misled about the buildings and the population density. The proposed new definition of "storey" will give a new meaning to what will constitute, say, a four or five storey building, a meaning out of keeping with general English usage, that will no doubt covertly mislead the people. This is absolutely appalling. The proposal seeks to use the people's language to convey one thing to the people, while at the same time conveying altogether something else to the Ryde City Council.
    
    
14. Ryde City Council proposes to allow the building of new Units higher than existing ones. These existing Units will therefore lose panorama and sunshine, end up being in a hole, and therefore end up losing market value as well as losing the growth in the market value of their property.
    
    
15. A 6-8 storey new building is proposed to be built, involving, probably, additional storeys for car parking. This will create a terrorist target, something which residents would hardly want in their area.
    
    
16. Maybe all these changes will have the effect of raising insurance premiums in the area. Insurance companies are not charitable organisations. They are in the insurance business in order to make money, not to lose it. If they see an increased risk, they will undoubtedly raise premiums.
    
    
17. Why change the character of Top Ryde anyway? Exactly who are the people that are wanting such changes? The residents? The developers? Or the staff of Ryde City Council who will then go on and brag about their alleged planning expertise, and therefore then demand more remuneration and other perks?
    
    
18. As part of its indoctrination process of local residents, that is being called community consultations, Ryde City Council is highlighting the odd buildings which it claims are ugly. But ugliness, as well as beauty, are such only in the eyes of the beholder.
    
    Even if these highlighted buildings are considered to be ugly, if so, nonetheless, these buildings in the area were previously approved by Ryde City Council itself. Ryde City Council, then, is subtly attempting to sheet home the blame for such planning blunders onto others, blunders which it, itself, has committed in the past.
    
    Ryde City Council, therefore, cannot possibly be left exclusively to monopolise the planing for the future of Top Ryde. The blunders of its alleged planning will surface not now, at this present time, but later, much later, in about twenty to thirty years' time.
    
    
19. Ryde City Council seems more caring and responsive to the wishes and needs of the developers, who probably live in cosy comfort by the sea shore in luxurious homes with splendid ocean views and who obviously do not live in Ryde.
    
    Council seems unconcerned about leaving the people in Ryde to live in sardine like conditions, in crowded little boxes. It has the Bastille unconcerned arrogance, telling the people to eat over development.
    
    
    

Where To Complain - Some Regulatory Authorities

The list of persons to contact, their telephone number, and email address are as follows:

1.  Mr Morris Iemma, Premier of NSW: Telephone No. 9228 5239, and email address:

thepremier@www.nsw.gov.au

2.  Mr John Watkins, Member for Ryde, Deputy Premier and Minister for Transport: Telephone No. 9808 3288, and email address:    

john.watkins@parliament.nsw.gov.au

3.  Mr Frank Sartor, Minister for Planning:  Telephone No. 9228 4700, and email address:

office@sartor.minister.nsw.gov.au

4.  Mr Kerry Hickey, Minister for Local Government:  Telephone No. 9228 3333, and email address:

localgovt@hickey.minister.nsw.gov.au

5. If you feel that Ryde City Council has treated you not as you'd expect, then refer the matter to Mr Bruce Barbour, NSW Ombudsman:  Telephone No. 9286 1000, and email address:   

nswombo@nswombudsman.nsw.gov.au

6. If you feel that there's been some corruption going on and if you have some evidence, then refer the matter to Ms Irene Moss, Independent Commission Against Corruption:  Telephone No. 8281 5999, and email address:   

icac@icac.nsw.gov.au

Remedies

The following remedies are proposed:

1. The Ryde Town Centre should be abandoned altogether.
   
   
2. An official Administrator should be appointed to manage Ryde City Council, forthwith.
   
   
3. The Local Government Act should be changed immediately in order to make Councils more responsible and accountable to the people.
   
   
4. This responsibility and accountability must be audited by an independent third party, which does not receive any consulting fees.
   
   
5. The staff of Councils should revert back to using their old job titles, in order to remind them that they are public servants, servants of the people, not their masters.
   
   
6. New legislation should be enacted to force Councils to adhere to the principles of social justice, whereby the winners of any over development should compensate the losers of such development without the losers having to take legal action in order to seek compensation. Two Commandments of God could be involved here that may apply, namely, "Thou shalt not steal," and, "Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's goods."  Also applicable could be Confucius' advice: "Do not impose on others what you yourself do not desire," and Jesus Christ's Divine Words: "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."  Of course, as would be expected, all the winners are patently supporting and promoting the Ryde Town Centre, and are ignoring or downplaying its adverse detriments. These winners are also concurrently not proposing nor providing any compensation of any kind whatsoever to the losers, a redistribution of wealth to the rich that is hardly tenably or fair.
   
   
7. New legislation should be enacted in order to provide for the personal prosecution of the actual individuals responsible for breaking Council laws, in much the same way that the corporate veil has been lifted in respect of certain torts committed by a company's personnel.
   
   
8. Citizen initiated referenda must be legalised now, in order to curtail abuses of power, privilege, and trust by public servants. Over the years, many municipal councils have indeed become extremely arrogant and much too dictatorial, overriding or ignoring, by subtle covert or Pharisaical means, the wishes and interests of the vast majority, the residents and ratepayers who want to live reasonably comfortably, in favour of the tiny minority, the developers who simply wish to make heaps of money in Ryde and elsewhere. After an over development, these developers simply go away and retreat to their opulent habourside environments or semi rural abodes, while leaving the residents of Ryde and districts to live in sardine like conditions in congested traffic chaos.
   
   

Staff Of Ryde City Council

If the Ryde Town Centre is approved, then some of the top echelon staff of Ryde City Council would be able to demand more money, more remuneration and other perks, much like many Directors of public companies have voted themselves in huge directors' fees and other perks.

This would seem to be classic Spinoza philosophy theories in action. 

In addition, there would also be the anomaly created whereby, Ryde City Council would be raking in millions of dollars more in rates and other charges, and the NSW Government having to find the moneys to pay for the costs of the additional amenities and other infrastructure requirements.

Proposals Abandoned... So Far... For The Moment

The known list of proposals abandoned so far, at least for the moment, include the following:

1. The building of a much bigger and more luxurious skyscraper in West Ryde, in order to accommodate the staff of Ryde City Council.
   
   
2. The closing off Blaxland Road and diverting all the car traffic onto Tucker Street, adjacent to Ryde Primary School, adjacent to where innocent little kiddies go to school and play.
   
   
3. While there have been some temporary minor changes to the plan, the outcome nonetheless involves gross over development and should be resisted. It is only the people who do not, or who will not in due course, live in Top Ryde that wish to change it for those who do, to live in sardine like conditions in congested traffic chaos. Furthermore, The Traffic and Pedestrian Study has already foreshadowed and documented increased traffic, not less.

Elected Councillors - Current

As a result of the NSW Municipal Council elections held on 27 March 2004, 7 new Councillors in respect of Ryde City Council were elected. Obviously, the voters wanted substantive change, but I'm not holding my breath waiting for it to eventuate. The non-elected staff still seem to be exercising excessive power, either by indirect means, or by 'long ago acquired' delegated authorities to act for and on behalf of the elected Councillors, who themselves may not even know about the possible existence of such delegated authorities. Maybe these delegated authorities should now be revoked, if they exist, so that the inherent powers may revert back to being exercised by duly convened Council Meetings.

The following are the names of all current elected Councillors, together with their contact details and other brief information: 

Legal Jurisdiction

The proper law arising from any matter whatsoever in this publication, or anything else on this website, shall be the law of the State of New South Wales and all disputes shall be dealt with in the Courts of that jurisdiction.

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