Gondola details to be divulged

Press, 17 January 1986, Page 5

Gondola details to be divulged

Heathcote residents will soon have a chance to register their concerns about the proposed Port Hills gondola cable-car complex. The project’s promoters have called a public meeting on January 28 to present residents with full development details.

The meeting, which would be held at the Heathcote Community Centre at 7.30 p.m., would also give residents the chance to ask questions about the project, said Mr Richmond Paynter, managing director of Paynter Holdings, Ltd, one of the project’s two promoters.

The project will include a tourist gondola from the Heathcote tunnel portal to

the top of Mount Cavendish, or to a point 50 metres below the summit. Both routes would include a restaurant.

About 120 residents, as well as more than a hundred people from outside Heathcote Valley, have signed a petition expressing concern about the project. Mr Paynter said he was anxious that residents understood what was being proposed and how it would affect them.

The promoters hoped to lodge a formal planning application in April, and if a favourable decision was reached, it would take a year to construct the complex, said Mr Paynter.