Anger at bulk grain facility

During the hype surrounding Southern Downs Regional Council’s (SDRC) approval of the chicken hatchery outside of Allora, SDRC slipped in under the radar and delivered yet another blow to local residents.
This time the nod was given to re-open the bulk grain facility at the southern end of the main street, Herbert St.  The depot was built in the 1970s by the State Wheat Board but, with the closure of the Allora branch railway line, it was closed to farmer grain deliveries by Graincorp in the 1990s.
Without any signage to notify the public of the new owner’s intentions, Council gave permission, not only to re-open the facility, but also to expand it. New entrances were constructed by the council, apparently to facilitate some 30-plus B-Double trucks that will be using the depot daily. Roads are being built. Trees have been cut down (so much for SDRC’s greening policy – Old Phones for New Trees!). Further storage units will be built, including areas for unsightly containers.
Residents living opposite the depot (including Allora’s nursing home) have been inundated with dust from the construction and have to keep doors and windows shut. But they can’t keep out the pervading noise that starts at 6.00am and continues into the night. When the facility finally opens, residents will not only have to endure the visual pollution left by this development, but also the continued noise from the B-Double trucks picking up containers, night and day. How will their houses fare on the property market as a result?
Yet the residents have not been given the opportunity to voice their protests and the whole project has been shrouded in secrecy right from the beginning.
When one resident entered the depot to ask what was going on, he was ordered off the property. Another resident called into council offices to ask for an information sheet regarding the development and was told that they were not allowed to give out information. Council’s reply to the protest of why residents were not notified in advance is that the depot is “an existing facility” and, consequently, they were under no obligation to provide notification. Does that mean that, if I have an existing shed on my property, then I don’t have to have Council approval to build another? Council also claims that there was some notification in the newspaper, but no one in Allora seems to have read it.
SDRC is again not being transparent with Allora residents. It would be interesting to see Council’s response to a proposal to develop an industrial site at the end of Palmerin St. I guarantee, that would go no further. But here, in Allora, it’s a different story. We desperately need a voice in so-called regional local government.
Michele Smith
Allora