Another festival, another washout. How is it possible that Byron Shire promoters continue to invite people to events when they can’t provide a safe, all-weather venue to host these expensive festivals?
Why did our state government endorse these dangerous flood-prone sites? Why does Council permit events on sites that are obviously not appropriate?
The Byron Writers Festival organisers had several days’ notice to prepare for a wet-weather event but there were no covered walkways between marquees, no shelter around the entrance or the coffee vans for queuing patrons who were forced to stand in teeming rain.
The paths were soggy and slippery with pooling water spreading under seated guests in the marquees. It was hard to hear the speakers above the rain. The $10 carpark was a saturated bog in the morning and a quagmire in the afternoon.
There was no Plan ‘B’, though the Bangalow School hall, the pub, and the bowling club could have been utilised.
Did Council offer any support before or during the event? Compliance and safety officers were nowhere in sight.
We almost had a new entertainment venue included on the sports site in Ewingsdale Road, proposed by Jan Barham’s council 20 years ago. The Blues and Splendour festivals had outgrown the Byron sites and were invited to collaborate and move their events to the proposed new facility. Council would lease the venue and provide all the essential services: toilets, water, power, garbage collection and hopefully make additional income for the Shire.
The sticking point was capping the festivals at 20-25,000 patrons, which the community supported. The cap was unacceptable to Byron’s festival entrepreneurs who wilfully purchased two new flood-prone sites in North Byron – spreading the adverse impacts up to Tyagarah, Brunswick Heads, Ocean Shores and Yelgun. The move hasn’t been successful, Byron is too far away and it’s not fun slipping and sliding around in mud for days. Most patrons don’t want to repeat the experience especially when the costs have soared and the enjoyment has soured.
After 35 years running festivals and making handsome profits, what does Byron Shire have to show for it? What did our great entrepreneurs build as a living legacy? All those thousands of volunteer hours, yet what have they created?
We’re still without an all-weather, money-making venue but those festival promoters got rich. At least we got to enjoy the music and the great conversations.
For four decades The Echo has printed the stories some people loved, some people hated, and some pretended not to read. If you want us to keep telling the truth, the real truth, not the sugar-coated version. We’ll need your support to keep the presses rolling. 
