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Catherine Delahunty of the Greens is putting forward a Private Member's Bill aiming to extend Schedule Four to include Karangahake Gorge. Seems pretty confident of support from left. Quite a few compliance issues with access to mountain NTG needs to address, too. It's very narrow road, with no room to widen in some places, and long areas with no possible passing bays. New Talisman have to get their traffic management plan approved by council, and locals are out with their tape measures, making submissions and generally getting pretty stroppy, and making it very clear they are not wanting to share this road with a mining company. There's extremely heavy usage during tourism season, which will exacerbate access problems, and will add to road congestion. That, combined with local's own heavy usage of that road... there may be a surprising quantity of flat tyres, and machanically unsound vehicles on that road, and people who love the mountain making an PARTICULAR effort to visit it, and approaching it and parking at NTG's SOLE access point. Be pessimistic, New Talisman Gold investors, be very pessimistic :-(
C de la H can put all the Private Members Bills she likes. It still has to get drawn. On top of that it is against the law to prevent other people from using a public thoroughfare and Im sure the police will be taking a dim view of tampering with vehicles. The Gorge itself will be unaltered except from natural causes.