The last council was majority-progressive and the tactics of the minority became more and more nasty as time went on. The new council is 5-4 majority conservative. The new lord mayor (former journalist Charles Wooley) kicked off by saying he wants to "make Hobart great again" ... and then gave the departing Lord Mayor a serve. Disappointing and just ... inept. I realised; this guy needs an editor. Elf says he will not hack it, and will quit inside a year.
He and the others (Liberal / Nat aligned and in one case, a budding Pauline Hanson) are planning to wind back and erase a lot of progressive changes to the city. I think they will find going back to doing things the way they were done is not going to bring back a thriving downtown.
Someone wrote to the paper celebrating the new council, and said they came back recently after 20 years away and cried at what Hobart has become. I would say to them and anyone else talking the place down, that Hobart is magnificent. It's going fine. People are flocking here from all over the world. We can't stand still, we've got to look after it especially when it is at risk of being loved to death.
It's got problems... in common with all other cities in Australia and around the globe. You won't fix them by taking out bike lanes.*
*I say this as a person who thinks our bike lanes are half-arsed and as a daily pedestrian finds cyclists quite irritating.
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