A better route for the Woden tram

That is that the current Civic to Capital Hill section of the Woden light rail, will involve years of major traffic and parking problems, and massive associated financial cost to the community.

That's not to mention the destruction of the cultural landscape of Commonwealth Avenue, the open-space character of City Hill, and the fine engineering heritage there and at State Circle, all set against the still unresolved, super critical problem of how to cross the lake.

Then there's the blight of tawdry "land-value-capture" property development at City Hill south, as well as along Commonwealth Avenue, and the requirement for an underground power system.

An alternative route has been staring decision makers in their faces for ages. It solves all of the above problems, with other community, commercial, and national capital advantages.

It involves the open road reserve along the north edge of Edinburgh Avenue (close to the footbridge over Parkes Way to Acton Foreshore), part of McCoy Circuit and Liversidge Street in the ANU, the south shore of Acton Peninsula, an easier-to-construct new arching curving tram/pedestrian/bike bridge (redolent of Griffin's missing crossing there) over to the narrowest point of Lennox Gardens, and up Flynn Drive to State Circle.

On a related matter, Floriade could or should move south to the potentially better, sunnier, lakeside Flynn Place precinct (on the tram line).

I am appalled at the sentiments in Mokhles K Sidden's letter (Letters, July 23) "congratulating" us all on the departure of Hamish MacDonald from the ABC.

Hamish was one of the ABC's best journalists, displaying empathy and compassion as well as an intelligent engaged mind. He was also courageous enough to ask the questions we all wanted answered but were afraid to ask, precisely because of the negative consequences Hamish has experienced.

It is a disgrace that the abuse Hamish was subjected to has led to his departure. Trolls are not exercising free speech; they are bullies and like all bullies they are cowardly.

The likes of Mokhles K Sidden do not speak for me. You will be sorely missed Hamish and I wish you well in your next endeavour.

Ray Peck (Letters, July 25) says Morrison's government risks "going down as the most unethical and negligent in Australia's history" due its stance on climate change. In my lifetime, there have been governments at all three tiers that have managed to be one or the other. Should anyone in the federal LNP government be reading this page, I say "it's not a race" to get to the bottom.

I don't understand why Senator Katy Gallagher doesn't introduce a bill into the Senate for repeal of the Euthanasia Laws Act 1997 (otherwise known as the "Andrews Bill"). It would be a simple act to bring on formal legislative debate about the two territories' right to make laws about themselves, including in respect of voluntary assisted dying. It would bring Zed out into the open and force him to actually cast a vote rather than posturing in the media. Over to you Senator Katy.

If only the heading had read "Parliament locks out the pollies to prevent outbreak" ("Parliament locks out the public to prevent outbreak", canberratimes.com.au, July 27).

Those politicians and staffers who flout any of the rules and advisories set down for inside and outside their workplace while here for next week's sitting should be named and bundled home immediately.

Particular attention should be paid to monitoring the blatant COVID-19 sceptics, as well as all those who have dismissed or played down the public health benefits of mask wearing, vaccinations and lockdowns.

May the public be alert and keen to report evidence of unsafe behaviours outside Parliament House. A whimpering "sorry" from the PM for Parliament becoming a superspreader event would not be acceptable.

Zed Seselja ("Just how much power should 13 people have?", July 21, p21) did not provide any reference for a core part of his argument where he asserts that "most concerningly overseas experience demonstrates that the terminally ill feel pressured into assisted suicide so as not to be a burden. In Oregon in 2016, half the people killed under the scheme cited being a burden, compared to just one-third who cited inadequate pain management as a reason for requesting assisted suicide. So much for choice and autonomy".

He could choose to remedy that omission in the future. However I won't be holding my breath, knowing the consequences.

However I do suggest that readers look at a peer reviewed article in the Journal of the American Medical Association which noted that loss of autonomy (2235 [87.4 per cent]), impaired quality of life (2203 [86.1 per cent]), and loss of dignity (1755 [68.6 per cent]) were the most common reasons for pursuing medical aid in dying.

I know the ABC is required to cover state government COVID-19 press conferences but give a state premier the "talking stick" and they will not relinquish it easily. Allow about an hour while the premier, health minister, medical director and police superintendent all have a say. Just for fun, the local dog catcher might be included.

After about three of these press conferences a day, a committed viewer's eyes may glaze over to the point of being comatose.

How about the ABC corrals all press conferences onto to the News Channel, and frees up Channel 2 for viewers who don't want to miss out on reruns of Landline or Hard Quiz. Just saying...

Bill Coote (Letters 22 July) should have continued his search a little further for information about polio vaccine production. The situation is nicely summarised in the entry on the National Museum of Australia website.

It is made clear that Dr Perceval Bazeley of the Commonwealth Serum Laboratories had been working with Dr Jonas Salk at the University of Pittsburgh since 1952 and when he returned to Melbourne in 1955 he helped set up the production of the Salk killed virus vaccine with the first supplies becoming available in June 1956.

As regards his comment about the vaccine causing polio in the US, this was the infamous Cutter Laboratories-produced vaccine which had not been treated properly to kill the virus. The CSL-produced vaccine was subjected to stringent safety testing and no such unfortunate infections occurred here.

Does anyone care to start a book on how many days until the first federal politician, or staffer, gets found out at a restaurant or club. I have about as much faith in them as I do the careless sportsmen, who are putting us all at risk.

These arrogant, self-important pollies like to tell us what is the right thing to do but believe the rules don`t apply to them.

Make them work remotely like most of the rest of the country. We don`t want them converging on Canberra from all over the country, bringing Delta with them.

They certainly don`t deserve the title "essential workers".

I am increasingly angry when dealing with the unnecessary distress of residents of nursing homes and their husbands, wives, sons, daughters and loved ones in the community who are unable to see them.

It has become the new norm that as soon as there are two or three cases of COVID-19 in the community our knee jerk reaction is to deny the frail elderly in nursing homes any companionship at all with loved ones.

Whilst this was understandable early in the pandemic, when we had no other way of defending them, now all nursing home residents are fully vaccinated.

That is not the case for their nurses, carers, cooks, cleaners, administration staff or trades people.

We now have the insane situation where a fully vaccinated wife cannot see or feed her fully vaccinated husband in a nursing home, but an unvaccinated nurse or carer can and does.

I put it to you that locking down nursing homes with fully vaccinated residents now and in the future is cruel and lazy policy making.

It must stop.

So, your correspondent, Mario Stivala (Letters, July 21), thinks the ABC is dominated by the ideology of the left. Does he believe that the Murdoch press offers a balanced and objective alternative?

David Richards has a very naive view of Sussex Street politics if he thought Kristina Keneally was "the political master" of Tripodi, Obeid, etc (Letters July 26).

The ANU's rhyming slang project may not be aware of the health benefits of starting each day with a Donald Trump.

Bravo our to women's freestyle 4x100m relay team. Not just a gold medal but a world record. I believe Emma McKeon will be remembered as the finest swimmer of her generation.

Apropos the piece on Zed Seselja in Sunday's Canberra Times. Isn't it lovely to find a current politician, a Liberal Senator, standing up straight and telling us what he believes. Good on you, Zed.

I would like to know why public servants, on return from overseas, can stay in ANU apartments for quarantine, yet the facilities are not considered satisfactory for quarantining international students. Why the inconsistency?

Caroline Kennedy would need to cover up if she wanted to work for our Home Affairs. Her sleeveless dress in The Canberra Times of July 24 was quite shocking.

Can someone please hand our drowning PM a giant lump of coal so he can sink further into political oblivion.

Demonstrations during a pandemic. I would introduce martial law and a curfew effective immediately.

On Saturday we saw thousands of people protesting what they imagine freedom is. No one really has total freedom. Endangering the lives of innocent people to spread ignorance as an ideology isn't freedom. It's a pack of selfish, self-centred gits feeling sorry for themselves.

We could re-energise with renewables, reach essential net zero greenhouse emissions faster, and rejoice, if it wasn't for Joyce.

Fred Goldsworthy (Letters, July 27) accuses Zed Seselja of being "dishonest" for basing his calculation of the "average cost of electric vehicles" on a list that includes expensive vehicles. What part of "average" does Mr Goldsworthy not understand?

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