I LOVE Gawler’s historic buildings and walls, but most of our historic walls were never engineered to stand the test of time.
Like the vast majority of people who commented on The Bunyip’s article and Facebook post, I’d support the restoration of the Pioneer Park wall if the costs were reasonable, but spending over $2.3m more of rate payers money to essentially give us back a replica of what currently exists, at a time when Gawler Council’s ballooning debt already exceeds $2m this financial year alone, and when there are so many other needs and so many pressing priorities in our town, is just crazy, wasteful and an irresponsible use of our rates.
The Pioneer Park cemetery was no longer in use after 1870 and fell into disrepair. In 1933, with most headstones removed, the cemetery was levelled, landscaped, and dedicated as parklands and that landscaping included removing all the graves along the northwest corner to create the angled grassed ramparts that face Murray Street and Union street to this day.
Given the bizarro-world price tag of over $2.3m more to restore the Pioneer Park wall, the sensible solution is to demolish the wall and to produce a grassed angled rampart like we have directly to the north of the monument where Pioneer Park faces Murray Street.
And before anyone cries out ‘you can’t disturb the graves behind the wall’, remember that several graves have already been removed during the current excavations and many more were removed when the cemetery was levelled, landscaped, and the grassed ramparts established in 1933.
There will be those who’ll say restore the wall at any cost, just like there were those who wanted ToG to spend over $1.2m of rate payer money to buy the old St Georges Church tennis court and gift it to the residents of Church Hill, but once again, common sense and responsible use of public money must prevail.
Just like when Darryl Kerrigan tells son Dale in The Castle to tell the guy selling jousting sticks that ‘he’s dreaming at that price’, so we must tell Mayor Redman and her council that spending $2.3m of our money to restore a few meters of old wall is beyond a dream – it’s a financial nightmare.
Ian Tooley, Gawler East
