WET weather last year has delayed the upgrade of a car park that will create new spaces for Keppel Street, according to Bathurst Regional Council.
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Work on an unsealed part of the Neighbourhood Centre car park, between Russell Street and Keppel Street, began in August last year to provide more parking for the precinct.
Council says the work will create 51 new car parks - 35 by sealing a previously unsealed section of the car park and a further 16 by reconfiguring the existing car park layout – to take the total number of spaces to more than 90.
A sealed car park was among the key elements of a wish list identified some years ago by the Keppel Street business community and the upgrade has been long-anticipated.
But though almost a year has passed since the work began, the job has yet to be finished.
Council general manager David Sherley said wet weather was to blame.
“Weather constraints in 2016 caused delays to many outdoor construction projects, with the BINC [Neighbourhood Centre] car park work being one of the projects affected by rain,” he said.
“In addition to the general car park works, the construction of the urban sensitive rain garden elements were complex and took time to design and install.
“In respect to remaining works that are still required to complete the car park, council has programmed for a final finish seal to the entire car park, which is not able to be undertaken until the optimum time of the year for sealing works.
“Such works are undertaken in November as part of council's sealing contract works for Bathurst.
“Line marking of the car park will be completed following sealing works.”
There have been some encouraging developments in Keppel Street since a group of businesspeople in the precinct made a public appeal in early 2013 for council to invest in the street.
“We know we have something unique and want to enhance and preserve it,” spokesman Peter Wright, of Central Commercial Printers, said at the time.
In the time since, the Bathurst Library forecourt has had a $45,000 makeover in which the brick wall facing the street was taken down and a new sign, seating and paving were added.
Work began this month, meanwhile, on a project that will add car parking spaces further down Keppel Street.
The NSW Government is spending $700,000 to extend the Bathurst Railway Station car park to add 43 spaces to the station.
Bathurst Regional Council also plans to build a $2.5 million rail museum in the historic Bathurst Railway Institute on Havannah Street at the bottom end of Keppel Street.