A fresh State and Federal funding bid to complete the Northern Rivers Rail Trail should be launched following the failure of a $42 million application earlier this year, according to a major new blueprint for the region’s economic future.

The developers behind the massive West Byron housing project are back for round two in their bid to install a pedestrian crossing on Ewingsdale Road, just weeks after councillors rejected a traffic-light version of the proposal.

With news that the last of Byron Shire’s pod villages will be closed by the end of the year, both residents and the wider community are asking: where will they go in a region where vacancy rates are less than 0.5 per cent?

Around 9.30am yesterday (Sunday 30 August), a Westpac Rescue Helicopter was tasked by NSW Ambulance to a motor vehicle accident at Coraki, south of Lismore.