Cairns business Pickers Vinyl and Canvas hit with council machinery noise conditions
A mechanical racket that reportedly left a neighbour suffering vertigo and rendered a cochlear implant useless has been resolved after some strict intervention.
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A MECHANICAL racket that reportedly left a neighbour suffering vertigo and rendered a cochlear implant useless has been resolved after some strict intervention.
Cairns Regional Council has come down hard on long-term local shade sail business Pickers Vinyl and Canvas after receiving complaints about its use of a very loud steel drop saw.
Division 5 councillor Amy Eden thanked the long-suffering neighbours for their patience, noting it had taken two years for the council to finally arrive at its decision.
“I have seen their health deteriorate, (from) a broken collarbone due to extreme vertigo to cochlear implants that can no longer be used” she said.
“So it’s not just one neighbour, there are multiple neighbours that are affected.”
New conditions mean the equipment can now only be used from 7am-6pm on weekdays and 7am-1pm on Saturday, with no use on the Lord’s day or public holidays.
However, it can only be used if Pickers installs a range of intensive soundproofing infrastructure that may prove so expensive the business instead shifts the work off site.
That was exactly what Deputy Mayor Terry James hoped would happen.
“It’s only a matter of time,” he said.
“The business has grown over the years and it does extremely well.
“Eventually they will have to make another move, and hopefully the correct one, and go to a bigger and better site in an industrial estate.”
The neighbourhood in Westcourt is an unusual mix of residential, retail and light industrial uses which can clash at times.
A statement made to the council on Pickers’ behalf stated the cost of enclosing the drop saw area of the workshop, as per the conditions, would cost $65,000.
It went on to call the conditions “unreasonable and not required”,
The council’s planning committee meeting disagreed and voted unanimously to impose the operational constraints.
Division 7 councillor Max O’Halloran said it was time for Pickers to accept reality and look at industrial property.
“There’s a simple answer here,” he said.
“Common sense generally goes out the window because it becomes a competition, but … I think you could simplify it and have it cut off site on industrial sites.
“My suggestion is that they sit down, simplify it, it would save Pickers a lot of money – when get into acoustics you’re talking big money.
“My heart goes out to the older community there.
“I would suggest that common sense prevails.”
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Originally published as Cairns business Pickers Vinyl and Canvas hit with council machinery noise conditions
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