Coastal ecology group mounts Supreme Court case against Environment Minister Ian Hunter over Semaphore to Grange cycling path
A COASTAL protection group has launched legal action against the State Environment Minister to stop a 3m-wide walking and cycling path from being built from Semaphore to Grange.
- Ian Hunter promises solution for Port Augusta dust clouds
- Ian Hunter pledges $55m to fix Adelaide’s bursting water mains
- Burst water mains brings peak-hour traffic chaos
A COMMUNITY coast protection group has launched legal action against the State Environment Minister as it continues its bid to stop a 3m-wide walking and cycling path from being built from Semaphore to Grange.
The Coastal Ecology Protection Group, as well as Tennyson residents Lorimer Packer and Donald Howie, were granted permission on Thursday by Supreme Court Justice Malcolm Blue to add Environment Minister Ian Hunter to its legal case against Charles Sturt Council.
In papers submitted to the court, the group said Mr Hunter made an invalid decision in December when he approved an application by the council to add the words “coast path” as a new use for the government land.
Existing uses listed for sections of the land before the “coast path” use was added included preservation of natural features and coast protection.
Barrister for the group, senior counsel Michael Roder, told Justice Blue that Mr Hunter had been added as a defendant and the CEPG had amended its statement of grounds.
Mr Roder said the CEPG had brought in an independent ecologist to conduct a report into the parcels of land, and he disagreed with a ministerial delegate’s conclusions that the area had “no significant biodiversity value.”
“The draft report (from the CEPG’s ecologist) is directly to the contrary,” Mr Roder said.
Justice Blue directed lawyers for the CEPG to supply the ecologist’s final report to the court and defendants by April 6, with the next hearing scheduled for April 11.
As a result of Mr Hunter being added to the case, Justice Blue said a trial would not begin until May or possibly as late as August.
The council’s barrister Stuart Henry SC said “my client has made it clear we are keen to get on with this matter”.
A CEPG spokesman told the Westside Weekly after the court hearing: “The CEPG have joined the Minister for the Environment to our action against the City of Charles Sturt because there are now doubts surrounding the processes the Department of Environment took when rededicating parcels of coastal land to enable the Coast Park pathway to go ahead”.
Charles Sturt planned to start building the path in April and was in the detailed design phase with contractor BMD Constructions.
The proposed $6.5m path was planned to be built on council and state-owned land from Third Ave, Semaphore Park in the north, through the Tennyson dunes, to Terminus St, Grange.