Katherine MP Sandra Nelson said it was not enough to post comments on social media, residents need to articulate their concerns to the government. 

“I read the comments on social media, and I do take them on board but that’s not enough, people say there wasn’t enough consultation with the community, well we have a government, and you have a local member now who is really big on community consultation, we just need people to participate properly,” Ms Nelson said. 

“There was a lot of consultation done by the government, and by the previous government as well, they started consultation in 2015, so I was surprised at some of the comments that I read that people weren't aware of the consultations that had taken place.”

“I’m a bit surprised and a bit disappointed, governments go to a lot of trouble to make sure there is proper consultation happening, so somewhere a long the way we haven't been doing it right, I know I want to be doing it right,” she said. 

“Some of the things I read had to do with road safety, yes that’s a big concern, but that wasn’t the number one driving force for this bypass, it’s just a small factor of it.”

“Its about future business growth and infrastructure, and if we are really serious about turning Katherine into a logistics hub we need to have that sort of a bypass,” 

Ms Nelson supports the truck bypass, she said Katherine needs to prepare for future generations. 

“I’m definitely in support of a bypass we are definitely going to need it.

“Its about growth and providing scope to grow, the main street works okay sometimes, but its not going to work okay in four or five years time taking into consideration the rate of growth and the traffic volume.” 

Ms Nelson said a bypass could prove to be economically prosperous for the town, with more businesses developing around the bypass route.

“I am in support of a bypass and I don’t think a bypass is really going to be as detrimental to Katherine as what people seem to think,”

“Right now trucks don’t stop in Katherine going through the main street they don’t actually stop in town because there is nowhere to stop in town.” 

“I think a bypass is providing them with an opportunity to actually stop, drop their trailers and maybe be able to come into town to get food.”

“I think there is an opportunity for new businesses to go up on the bypass... truck rest area, truck stop you know something.”

“The design looks like it will improve business growth in the area, and business growth away from the centre of town, you know this is in a flood zone so any opportunity to grow business outside of the flood zone is great.”

Ms Nelson said one of the major issues with the town is that there has been a lack of forward thinking when planning the town. 

“Certain parts of town it just seemed like somebody found an empty block of land and thought ‘lets just put a school there’ there is just mismatched pockets everywhere, the hospital is in a flood zone,” 

“The bypass is thinking 10, 20 years ahead and that’s what we need for this town,” 

“We still have time for people to submit their thoughts, opinions and objections to the bypass, the more people that participate in these programs, the more it becomes community thing.”

“It would be really good for me to be able to pass onto my colleagues, legitimate reasons as to why people are opposing this bypass,” she said.