· Slope is not favourable to boulder [sic] falling to the road or township.
The above 3D depiction of the Alum Mountain is Figure 2, page 3 of Volume 7 of the RTA’s Bulahdelah Upgrading the Pacific Highway Environmental Impact Statement (EIS).
The added X marks the approximate location of Bulahdelah Post Office. The post office is 10 metres above sea level. The mountain is 292 metres above sea level.
The added red lines are parts of Scott Street (which the RTA omitted from maps of the township throughout the EIS); MacKenzie Street, Church Street, Harold Street and Boolambayte Street.
The scribbled blue line over the foot of the mountain is the RTA’s portrayal of the six-lanes-plus-width Option E roadway which would be located in an excavation blasted and pile-driven to up to 24 (according to the EIS) or 25 (according to recent RTA statements) metres below current soil surface, through an existent landslide which has been documented by the RTA and beside/below another landslide which the RTA has chosen to ignore. It would also have over a quarter of a kilometre of mass movement- (landslides) and rockfall-prone mountain looming above it.
The entire above 3D figure from the EIS is facing in the wrong direction. (It was, of course, in relation to air – as in air flow/circulation from winds.) However, as the image shows, the Alum Mountain’s western foot extends all the way to the Myall River. All of Bulahdelah’s eastern residential area is located on the western foot of the mountain. This includes two schools which increase the population in that area by some 600 persons per day for over 1,200 hours each year.
This post initially published: 20th July, 2008.
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