Jacks Corner - blogs by Jack Ince

 
Insular ... By Jack Ince


Our little seaside village of Emu Park, whether we all like it or not, is coming of age.
With the expected opening of the small town's first full scale supermarket due before Christmas, it's a sign of the times. Even an ideal, peaceful place like Emu Park grows up.

Many probably don't want it changing but it's happening and the signs are all around us.
It wasn't that long ago, motorists barely had to wait at intersections - giving way to the right, obeying give-way signs or even expecting any other vehicles to cross our path.

About two years ago I noticed having to stop and wait for a few cars on the main Emu Park to Yeppoon Road but it was only ever for two or three cars and was not much more than an inconvenience.
 
Still caused plenty of muttering under the breath about what's happening to the town and where did all these people come from, but otherwise acceptable.

More recently, the same intersection has had perhaps 10 or 12 cars, counting either direction, and anything up to a 15 or 20 second wait! Makes me wonder how I'd go driving in Melbourne or Sydney these days but that's another story.
 
In the past month, I've even noticed having to wait for cars at the bottom of my hill just getting onto the street that leads to the Emu Park/Yeppoon road intersection. That two stops for traffic and there still a roundabout to go before getting to the local corner store.

How can things change so quickly?

Sure there been a lot of growth out Zilzie way with two major housing complexes filling and there's very few vacant blocks around town. When I first arrived in about 1980 every second block in Emu Park was empty and Zilzie stopped at Zilzie Point. Now we've got to the point of our first supermarket. Just a few years ago there were three supermarket applications submitted to council for approval.I know one has disappeared forever but there's still plenty of talk around town of even a second planned sometime in the future.
 
We've also got our own bank, and it just moved into bigger and brighter premises a month or so ago. We've even got two golf courses, a gymnasium, pizza and Thai restaurants, two bakeries and a whole lot more.
 
Yep, things are on the move in Emu Park and despite the naysayers, ultimately we'll all be thankful.

 
A few years ago I used to go to Rockhampton every fortnight for shopping and all usual bit a pieces you put off for the one big shopping day once or twice a month. Then Yeppoon opened a second full-scale supermarket, created competition and shopping there became more viable. Okay, so now I'm down to one trip a fortnight to Yeppoon but with Emu Park having it's own supermarket, and old mate, Trev, souping up the local hardware store, I won't have to go anywhere - ever again.

 
Ah bliss, but one has to be careful of not becoming too insular.

 
Maybe I should make sure I get to Yeppoon, Rockhampton and beyond more often. You know, just to see what's happening in the rest of the world. Rocky should give me an accurate picture of how the rest of the world is managing, shouldn't it?

 
We've got a recently upgraded flash road to Rocky but that big highway going either north or south from there, it's appropriately called the Bruce, is a bit of a goat track. Luckily, the State Government announced recently it would do something about it and was very firm about starting to look at improvements as soon as the next decade.

I know the global financial something or other slowed a lot of projects down and indeed the Emu Park supermarket was originally planned for a lot earlier but it's happening. Trips to nearly anywhere else can be avoided. Imagine the savings on petrol (and we all know we have to do our bit for the environment) and the lack of need to know anything that's going on anywhere else in our region or even the world.

Yeah, we're coming of age all right. Except me, I'm going the other way. And I'm yet to be convinced there's not a lot wrong with either that or becoming almost totally insular.