Dear Editor, I have read with interest the recent articles and smoke signals in your paper relating to the proposed and scary horseshoe road plan for the old Sheraton site.

I have two questions for the developers and responsible government agencies:

1. When and how will the affected Rarotonga community, road safety and emergency organisations be asked for opinions and input?

2. Why not leave the road as it is and plan a pedestrian crossing across to the “beach” for the hotel guests?

Such questions should not be ignored.

A road bypass may have been approved way back when conditions and traffic was different but this is now!

We need to “unapprove” the bypass for common sense reasons!

(Name and address supplied)

Response:

The position is shortly stated.

1. As long ago as 1990, Government sought to lease this land from the former Pa titleholder. It sought and obtained favourable terms for doing so. In return, among other promises, it promised to restore the land to its original beachfront status – to allow that to happen, Pa was asked to allow a larger parcel of her land to be taken for the relocated road, without being compensated for the difference in area.
2. That offer was accepted by the then Pa Ariki; as a result of which the land is now ‘encumbered’ with a beachfront oriented development that remains less than beachfront – and the Crown has not yet performed its agreed obligation of road relocation.
3. The consideration payable for the lease at the time was at less than market rental, and, itself, reflected the valuable concession around road relocation and restoration of beachfront status.
4. The Crown has repeatedly promised the current titleholder and lessees to perform its promise of road relocation – the only question has been as to who meets the cost of constructing the actual roadway.
5. Were the Crown to “change its mind”, it would need, statutorily, to extinguish its liability to relocate and would need to pay Article 40 compensation to Pa Ariki and to Radun Ltd as Lessee; the difference in value between this land (and improvements oriented as they are) as beachfront as compared with the current configuration would cost taxpayers several million dollars.
6. As matters stand, the current lessee, Radun Ltd, has agreed to meet the road relocation costs; the bridges in question are life-expired and will be replaced by the Crown as and when it is convenient to the Crown to do so.
7. The relocation of the road is not the subject of any current EIA as the issues to which you refer were considered and approved at the time of the original development – which is why the roadway was formed some 30 years ago. What has been approved cannot, now be “unapproved” without an Act of Parliament and compensation paid.
8. The remaining issues, therefore, do not arise under the Environment Act 2003; rather, they arise as a matter of appropriate roading standards – in respect of which it is generally accepted that a safe road speed of 30kmh (as in Town and through Muri) will be appropriate for engineering calculations for curvature, camber etc – that, of course, is the generally accepted minimum for State Highway 1 in New Zealand for curvature.
9. The roadway for the relocation as currently constructed and planned meets the standards for the main road around Rarotonga in this and all other respects.
10. Road safety and emergency vehicle access form part of the overall planning and construction of the road as relocated.

 Yours sincerely,

Tim Arnold.