James Stevens (Sturt, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I must say one of the silver linings of the coronavirus challenges we've all had has been the engagement of so many people again in the great outdoors. In my electorate of Sturt in particular, that's meant enjoying the beautiful bush walks that are available to us through the Adelaide foothills. In fact, in many cases it's in the member for Mayo's electorate rather than my own, but certainly my constituents enjoy that fantastic natural asset that we have.

But it has certainly exposed something that I've known for much longer than just the last few months: that we have insubstantial infrastructure to handle the great demand from the people who want to go and park in some of the areas adjacent to these bushwalks. So I was very pleased to see that the Burnside council had put forward a proposal for a new expansion of car parking halfway along Waterfall Gully Road at Chambers Gully. Happily—ask and you shall receive—the Commonwealth are contributing to and investing in that car-parking facility, which will be a really good outcome for the local residents there. At the moment, a lot of people are parking not quite within the rules, and that's quite frustrating if you're a resident. But also it's very difficult for people to fully access and enjoy the opportunities that are there for them to go on these lovely walks through the picturesque Adelaide Hills. So I commend the Morrison government for this decision and the Burnside council for coming up with the idea, and I look forward to a great outcome for my local community.