Public meeting to grill Vicroads

RESIDENTS objecting to section three of the Geelong bypass project will have the opportunity to sound out Vicroads at a public meeting on Wednesday night.
The State Government road authority was not invited to a protest meeting in July where South Barwon MP Michael Crutchfield was inundated with angry questions from the floor.
But the organiser of next week’s meeting, John Lam-bert, said Vicroads would attend to explain why the Government had chosen the unpopular option one route for the third stage of the bypass.
However, he warned people planning on attending not to expect a change of heart at the meeting.
“The issue is they (Vicroads) do as they are instructed and what we want is to have the decision reversed,” he said.
“To some degree to have them speaking is counter-productive because what they want to tell people is what they’re doing.”
Mr Lambert, who said he was a former Vicroads engineer, hoped City of Greater Geelong would also have a representative at the meeting to clarify council’s opinion on the proposed route of stage three.
“If it was going to be the current mayor attending, we wouldn’t be interested because we want somebody to give the council’s view, not the ALP’s view,” Mr Lambrt said.
The meeting will start 7pm at South Barwon Civic Centre.
Mr Lambert claimed most residents in southern Geelong were against option one, which ended at traffic lights in Waurn Ponds, and wanted stage three to go west of Deakin University.
Geelong Chamber of Commerce, a member of Mr Lambert’s community group fighting option one, backed a route further west.