Visions for Bathurst - 11 March 2010
What will Bathurst look like in 50 years' time? Will there be a conurbation spreading from Lithgow all the way through to Orange, with houses and warehouses sprawling along the Great Western Highway? Or will it still be a food-producing region, dotted with wind farms? How many people will live here, and how will they eat, work and play? For most of human history, the future just happened to us, but we now have the knowledge and resources to think ahead, to change course, to do things differently.
Today, we have "business as usual" chugging along with coal mining, over-consumption and a car-based culture. But we also have embryonic examples of what a sustainable, healthy future could look like. Bathurst Regional Council is now in the middle of a community consultation process around the themes of community, safety and culture. The results of this consultation will be worked in to the council's next five year plan. There will be open meetings at the Bathurst Memorial Entertainment Centre on Monday from 12 noon to 2.30pm and on Thursday from 6pm to 8pm. Yes, council is talking about the next five years but I think we need to add a zero and think about the next fifty. If we think about the healthy, sustainable future we want for the children being born this week, then the things we do in the next five years can help to lay the groundwork for that. So why not attend one of those meetings and throw in some left-field ideas! This is my wish list: local food production; an electric car race on Mt Pan; lots of bike paths and niche local renewable energy solutions like a wind farm or two. To book a place in the workshops, you need to ring the Council on 6333 6523.
The Bathurst Community Climate Action Network will be having its own public meeting to discuss visions for Bathurst at 5.30pm in the Courtyard room of the RSL Club on Wednesday April 7. We will hear a guest speaker from the Transition Towns movement and a presentation on bike paths.
The next meeting of the Bathurst Regional Food Group will be held at the Waratah Hotel on Tuesday March 16 from 5 to 7pm. The BRFG's aim is to promote local food production and consumption.