After hearing oral submissions last month on the Jellicoe Street option, the Council’s Sustainable Transport and Utilities (STU) Committee had recommended that Bridge Street as well as Beatty Street be investigated further. However, this was overturned at the full Council meeting in favour of Beatty Street only. Consultation will begin soon with Beatty St residents, South New Brighton School and other key stakeholders using Beatty Street.

A report comparing the outcome of the Jellicoe and Beatty streets consultations will be presented to STU in November, along with relevant legal and technical advice, so the Council can make a decision on the pipeline route.

Senior Planning Engineer John Moore says that in this planning phase extra information on the proposed ocean outfall is coming “At the moment we’re waiting for the legal opinion to come through about where we can build the ocean pipeline. It looks as if we won’t be able to use the South Brighton Domain as a construction site, and the same situation could well apply to the dunes. So we’re probably looking at construction out at sea.

“This means that whichever street is chosen, the disruption will be much less than previously envisaged when prefabrication of the pipe may have been undertaken within the domain — the same as for any other street in the city being dug up and having a large sewage pipe laid along it. For this reason, we need to also go back to Jellicoe Street residents and revisit their concerns about disruption and noise that would have been caused by pipe construction in their vicinity.”