Davenport Electorate

Ms THOMPSON (Davenport) (16:00): I rise to provide an update on a few exciting things happening in my community of Davenport. I would like to firstly celebrate the start-up of a new business in my electorate: Wild Pack Kayaks have set up shop on the banks of our beautiful Happy Valley Reservoir. You can now pop down and see Harmony, every day from 8am to 2pm, and hire a kayak for as little as $15 and head out for a relaxing paddle. I was fortunate enough to take our Deputy Premier out for a paddle a couple of weekends ago and was able to show her how special it is to see the reservoir from this perspective and to enjoy our precious Happy Valley wildlife. I wish Harmony all the best with her new business venture and am grateful to her for adding this fantastic service to our reservoirs.

The project to install on-off ramps at Majors Road is progressing very well. I would like to acknowledge and thank the hard work of the Department for Infrastructure and Transport in their community engagement on this project. They have been out holding community forums in multiple suburbs around the area, they have managed an online survey and they have attracted hundreds—over a thousand, I think—comments on multiple occasions to really speak to our community around what they are looking forward to and about any concerns that there might be with the project.

Some concerns were raised, and these concerns were primarily around any potential impact to Glenthorne National Park and to the other facilities around that site. I am extremely proud to be able to report back to our community that each of those concerns has been addressed in the latest designs that have been released to our community. There will be no impact on the Glenthorne National Park, no impact on the soccer facilities, no impact on the BMX facilities and no impact on the mountain bike facilities.

I know our community is particularly excited about this project, as it will ease traffic concerns for our residents and help them in getting into the city a little faster in the mornings and in the peak-hour traffic in the evenings. It will also help the people in my community of Davenport to easily access the south and all the beautiful offerings down there, such as McLaren Vale and Victor Harbor.

During the school holidays, I was proud to see the completion of five school safety upgrades. Together with the City of Onkaparinga, we have made crossings and areas around our schools a lot safer, at schools including Aberfoyle Park High, Aberfoyle Park Primary, Braeview Primary, Pilgrim Primary and Craigburn Primary. Craigburn Primary School will be completed later this month, with new lights being installed at the crossing. I know that a lot of the parents who send their kids to these schools are feeling much happier and more comfortable with their kids safely making their way to school each morning.

Road safety is a huge priority for my community. It is why we are also upgrading Main Road, Cherry Gardens. This project will progress over the next year or two, with works already having been started to investigate the road and exactly what those designs might look like. So the community can expect to see new concept designs coming out very soon for them to have their say on. Hopefully, later this year we will see the commencement of construction on that road. It is a particularly important project to our communities: there have been fatalities on that road, and it is extremely dangerous for many of the people in my community.

There is quite a list of projects underway in my community, but one that I would like to highlight that kicked off construction this week is the extension of Minkarra dog park. We are building an extension to the existing park to accommodate little dogs. We found that there are a lot of people in our community who had fears of going to the park because they had smaller dogs or puppies that were not yet socialised with the bigger dogs, so I know that those residents are particularly excited to be able to get their little dogs out and socialising. We are already seeing works started there now and we hope to see that completed by June. I am really looking forward to meeting some of the furry members of my community very soon.

A final project that I will mention today is the traffic study that we are doing at the intersection of Windebanks Road and Happy Valley Drive, as well as the intersection of Chandlers Hill Road and Happy Valley Drive. We have done a significant community consultation and traffic study on easing the traffic congestion at those intersections. We hope to be able to share some solutions for easing that traffic congestion with the community soon, and then hopefully I can follow that up with seeking some funding to deliver those solutions for our community.