Save the Basin misnamed

A good editorial from the Wellingtonian:

We have good news for the principals of the Save the Basin trust.

The Basin Reserve, one of Wellington’s premier sports venues, does not need saving. It is as safe as houses.

So why is there a save the basin campaign?

Therefore, it raises the question of the real agenda of the Save the Basin trustees.

The news section of their website deals only marginally with the Basin Reserve.

However, there are mentions of “a huge concrete flyover”, “the roar of trucks and the howl of boy racers from the flyover”, “clouds of pollution and car exhaust”.

It seems possible that the reason for the formation of the Save the Basin trust has more to do with preventing the building of the flyover than protecting “New Zealand’s oldest dedicated cricket pitch”, as the website describes the Basin.

So it is the usual “we like congestion” campaigners.

A Save the Basin protest gathering last week drew about a dozen protesters.

Their banners were focused almost exclusively on preventing the flyover being built. It was hard to find a mention of the Basin.

If Kent Duston, Iona Pannett and company don’t want the proposed flyover, it’s their right to try to stop it being built. If they want to ban cars, get rid of roads and return us to the horse-and-carriage age, it’s their prerogative to so campaign.

Pannett is of course a Green Party City Councillor. Duston was (he was a list candidate for the Green Party last election.

But the way things stand now, some people might feel they are being dishonest about their intentions, tugging at the emotions with their Save the Basin title, while actually running a separate campaign far removed from either the Basin or cricket.

Perhaps Ban the Flyover would not have quite the appeal of Save the Basin.

But at least it might more accurately reflect the trustees’ ambitions.

Indeed. I remember the decade plus campaign of protests against the motorway extension. And now it has happened, you would never go back. I find traffic down that end of town much faster moving now