At last night’s Wellington Scoop Mayoral Candidates forum, I asked each candidate, given that we didn’t yet know what options would emerge from the Let’s Get Welly Moving process, whether they would pledge not to support or vote for a flyover at or near the Basin Reserve.
Of the candidates:
- Justin Lester, Helene Ritchie, and Johnny Overton all gave a firm “no” to a flyover at the Basin.
- Nick Leggett still supports a Basin Reserve flyover, and stated that he was proud to have supported the previous, failed flyover proposal “because it was funded”. His position appeared to be that Wellington should agree with whatever the Government was prepared to fund.
- Jo Coughlan, Nicola Young, Keith Johnson and Andy Foster all said, with varying emphases, that a flyover was unlikely, or that there were better options, but didn’t give an absolute “no” to a flyover.
Save the Basin has also surveyed Mayoral and other candidates on their views of the future of the Basin Reserve and related issues. The deadline for responses to that survey is Friday, and we’ll be letting you know the results early next week. But for now, the answers given last night may assist you in deciding which Mayoral candidates to support.
Wellington Scoop, who did an excellent job of organising and hosting the forum, has put up a full report – it’s well worth reading!