Jayne Stinson, Member for Badcoe (FIVEaa 7.22-7.24)
(Host Will Goodings: You may recall … the plight of the kids who use their initiative to make a range of bike jumps in Edwardstown, and of course that can’t be done in this day and age, imagine the problems. Imagine how it looks, imagine the danger.) (Host David Penberthy: Someone might lose an eye.) (Goodings: Exactly right, and so it was recommended that it was taken down. Well, thankfully, we have some good news to report on this story, and thanks to some good work that’s happened in that part of Adelaide and indeed the generosity of some local businesses, it sounds like the kids an continue to build their jumps. Jayne Stinson is the State Member for Badcoe, Jayne just bring our listeners up to speed with what’s transpired.) Yeah, good morning guys … the Edwardstown bike jumps are a bit of an institution in my area, they’re right near the railway line at Edwardstown, and thanks to you guys for raising this with the Minister, Tom Koutsantonis, he put the brakes on the demolition of these bike jumps, thank goodness. Then we campaigned to be able to save it permanently and make the site safe and neat and tidy and something we can all really be proud of. So, there was a petition of local people with about 800 signatures, and I tabled that in Parliament, and the decision’s been made to keep it now. … It's a great win and thank you so much for your help with that, it’s been a really great thing for our community. So, since then I’ve been working with the young guys who built and use the jumps and we’ve now managed to get a little garden which is going to be looked after by the St Anthony’s local primary school students. We’ve got signage up there just warning people ‘take your own risks when you use this’, we’ve got some bins, we’ve got running water so the water’s really important to moulding these … jumps that they’ve got, we’ve also got a specially made lockable tool box which is going to be at the site and we’ve had a lot of luck from some local businesses who have raised their own money and chipped in to be able to buy about a $1,000 worth of tools for the kids. The tools went missing during all of this debacle but now they’ve got their tools back. So, Angus, who’s been leading the fight down there just got the tools on the weekend, and yeah, we’re just continuing to work hard and set this up for them so they’re not at home on their iPads or whatever, they can get out in the fresh air. (Penberthy: It’s a great result, Jayne, isn’t it nice to hear too, a resolution of an issue that isn’t just ‘well, you can’t do that, let’s stop it, let’s ban it’ … the local businesses that have come and helped out, one of those … the good people at Mitre 10 …)
Karen O’Reilly, Southern Endoscopy Centre (FIVEaa 7.25-7.28)
(Penberthy: Karen O’Reilly from Southern Endoscopy Centre is on the line as well, and Karen, I understand that you guys gave really generously to the kids so that they can continue to use this bike ramp.) … I actually heard about Angus some years ago, I think on FIVEaa when he first started building his jumps and I thought it was wonderful and refreshing and my fiancé, Peter … he was in landscaping and heard about Angus through a job that was being done, he’s no longer there, but he knew that we were all about community, and he let me know, we went for a drive down the road to have a look at the jumps and as we were driving down the road we saw Angus on his bike, shovel underneath his arm, riding to build some jumps and we had a chat with him and he’s just a lovely young man. So, we were absolutely happy to help. (Goodings: That’s terrific, Karen … good on you, Karen. Isn’t it nice to get a resolution to a story like this that involves something that works for everyone as opposed to the modern outcome whereby everything just gets banned or stopped?) (Penberthy: The best part of that story … is that in record time they got 800 signatures of people going listen, this is ridiculous … this started as a breaking at eight when one of the parents contacted me … that day Kouts texted in during breaking at eight and said no, hang on, I’m going to tell DIPTI to pull their heads in on this one and initially it was council people probably responding to the usual handful of people in the community going I don’t like what they’re doing over there – the fact that 800 people straight away went stuff this … shows that we have to remember, we talk about Australia being … really laid back. Is it?) (Goodings: No.) (Penberthy: It was good to see ordinary people go come off it, let the kids go out and have fun, take some risks, burn off some energy and have the time of their lives.) (Goodings: Absolutely.)