Sandon Pt opinions on air

A new documentary airing on Radio National today reveals Wollongong's northern community is overwhelmingly disappointed the controversial Sandon Point housing development was allowed to go ahead.

The 30-minute radio program, produced by former Ilwaeeara Mercury journalist Erin O'Dwyer, explores the relationship, attitudes, and contradiction between the multimillion-dollar housing development and the neighbouring Aboriginal tent embassy on McCauley's Beach.

For her debut — 'Kuraadji Dreaming on community, respect and understanding" Ms O'Dwyersaid she spent a week with tent embassy elder Roy "Dootch" Kennedy.

She also spoke to dozens of "ordinary people", who rarely had a change to share their opinion publicly.

"Overwhelmingly the opinion was one of disappointment that the development had gone ahead and that it wasn't in sympathy with the landscape", Ms O'Dwyer said. It wasn't a sense that development is bad, it was more of a sense of this was not done with consultation or with any kind of respect to what came before, particularly with respect to the Aboriginal heritage of that land."

Despite this attitude, Ms O'Dwyer found the two communities co-existed quite ahppily. But, she warned, there could be friction, if future development failed to recognise that heritage.

"I think what people want is consultation (and) appropriate amounts of green space left and that any development is in sympathy with the landscape," Ms O'Dwyer said.

"Any future development also needs to in some way recognize what came before."

The documentary, produced with assistance from ABC Radio Regional Production Fund, airs on Radio National (1431 AM) at 2pm today.