The Mayor clarifies the ownership of the Willow Court Tunnel in answering Cr Bester’s questions in April’s Council meeting of the Derwent Valley Council.
The Mayor advised that he was of the view that as the tunnel is on private land Council would have minimal controls on its usage, but if it was utilised to access the tunnel in Crown or Council Land the situation may be different.
Cr. Bester who is a strong supporter of the joint production of the Paranormal Film shot at Willow Court is keen on knowing the result of the outcome with the state’s Anti-Discrimination Commissioner and the Mayor answers as follows.
The Mayor advised that he would ask the General Manager to forward a copy of the correspondence to all councillors.
The General Manager of the Derwent Council answers a question about being flexible in the re-zoning arrangements to accommodate the buildings proponents of the oval precinct.
The General Manager advised that the simple answer was yes. Also changes to the zoning and also to the Conservation Management plan were done to achieve more flexibility in regard to being able to consider a commercial development on site.
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Cr. Bester’s interest in the Barrel drain is interesting to say the least, after all it is just a sewer. The history of the drain is well documented and a number of older local people well remember the sewer that transported the sewerage from WC to the River Derwent. Recently I had the privileged of meeting a woman whose father Dr Crabbe, a doctor at WC wrote the History of Lachlan Park just after WWII. Margaret was one of a number of people who were interviewed for the Walking Through Time podcasts (part of a historical walk around New Norfolk)and she took great delight in telling the story of how the sewer had to be dug up in the backyard of her home, because it had blocked. She was even able to describe the brick walls and she walk us around her old family home and pinpointed where the sewer was.
The sad thing about trying to create a ‘tunnel’ out of the sewer is that some in the community believe it was to secret people with mental illness from the boats that brought them to New Norfolk to Lachlan Park, so as not to frighten the locals.
Whereas,the well documented facts are that it took two to three days to row a boat from Hobart to New Norfolk and the people on board were subjected to extremely cold weather in the process. This method of transport was soon abandoned and people were transported to the asylum via horse drawn carriage. The sewer was abandoned 1941, as a result of an Act of Parliament.