| Good morning and welcome again to Your City Today. |
| With me today is Graham Campbell, a councillor from the city council. |
| He'll be telling us about the plan to improve the fast-growing suburb of Red Hill. |
| Good morning Graham and welcome to the show. |
| Good morning, Carol. |
| Now, Graham, I understand that there has been a lot of community consultations for the new plan? |
| Yes, we've tried to address some of the concerns that local groups told us about. |
| People we've heard from are mainly worried about traffic in the area, |
| and, in particular, the increasing speed of cars near schools. |
| They feel that it is only a matter of time before there is an accident as a lot of the children walk to the school. |
| So we're trying to do something about that. |
| Another area of concern is the overhead power lines. |
| These are very old and a lot of people we spoke to asked if something could be done about them. |
| Well, I'm happy to report |
| the power company have agreed to move the power lines underground at a cost of $800,000. |
| I think that will really improve the look of the area, as well as being safer. |
| That's good to know, |
| but will that mean an increase in rates for the local businesses in that area? |
| Well, the power company have agreed to bear the cost of this themselves after a lot of discussion with the council. |
| This is wonderful news |
| as the council now has some extra funds for us to put into other things like tree planting and art work. |
| Now, we've also put together a map which we've sent out to all the residents in the area. |
| And on the map we've marked the proposed changes. |
| Firstly, we'll plant mature pine trees to provide shelter and shade just to the right of the supermarket in Days Road. |
| In order to address the traffic problems, |
| the pavements on the corner of Carberry and Thomas Street will be widened. |
| This will help to reduce the speed of vehicles entering Thomas Street. |
| We think it's very important to separate the local residential streets from the main road. |
| So the roadway at the entry to Thomas Street from Days Road will be painted red. |
| This should mark it more clearly and act as a signal for traffic to slow down. |
| One way of making sure that the pedestrians are safe is to increase signage at the intersections. |
| A 'keep clear' sign will be erected at the junction of Evelyn Street and Hill Street, |
| to enable traffic to exit at all times. |
| Something we're planning to do to help control the flow of traffic in the area |
| is to install traffic lights half way down Hill Street where it crosses Days Road. |
| Now, we haven't only thought about the cars and traffic, of course, |
| there's also something for the children. |
| We're going to get school children in the area to research a local story, the life of a local sports hero perhaps, |
| and an artist will incorporate that story into paintings on the wall of a building on the other side of Hill Street from the supermarket. |
| And finally, we've agreed to build a new children's playground |
| which will be at the other end of Hill Street, close to the intersection with Carberry Street. |
| Wonderful! |
| Now, what's the next stage? |
| Well, the final plan... |