A Lake Macquarie councillor has started a petition advocating for a bridge to be built over Cockle Creek to replace Barnsley Weir.
North-ward councillor Kevin Baker launched the petition in an effort to gain support for the plan, which he first raised to council earlier this year.
The petition has garnered about 600 signatures, a number the Liberal councillor expects to grow on the back of the weir's closure last week. The single-lane weir, described as an "old-school piece of infrastructure" by Cr Baker, is regularly closed when there is heavy rainfall.
It had to be closed for more than a month in late 2018 after sustaining damage in storms and required a significant amount of structural reinforcement to reopen.
Any closure usually draws the ire of locals as road users are forced to take a 12 kilometre detour to travel between Teralba and Barnsley.
"People just don't really know how much this road is used, and how important this road is to people," Cr Baker said. "What my aim was, was to get some names behind it so we can say, 'this is a priority project for the council, we can't keep having this happen'.
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Cr Baker put forward a notice of motion at an April council meeting calling for an options analysis of the weir to be completed and a bridge confirmed as the leading option.
"Somebody only has to flush a toilet out there for the weir to close," he jokingly told the meeting.
The motion, which was passed, requested staff undertake detailed assessments to inform and complete a concept design in the 2019/20 financial year.
Funding options, including available state or federal government grants, would be considered after the work.
"We ended up saying investigate all possible options, but realistically it's a bridge [needed]," Cr Baker said.
"You're not going to redivert the road, there's no better point to cross it."
Cr Baker said with the growth occurring in north-west Lake Macquarie, a bridge should be fast-tracked to cater for increased traffic.
"In 2015, there was 2319 vehicles use the road per day," he said, referencing a council traffic study.
"But that's not just light vehicles, there's also a lot of heavy trucks that go over there as well. There haven't been any updated stats done but since 2015 the north-west side of the Lake with Cameron Park and West Wallsend, they've just all continued to explode, so I'd say that's definitely been increasing."
Lake Macquarie City Council said in a statement it was "working towards a solution that will provide permanent unrestricted access".
"We are currently finalising an options report to identify the preferred solution," the statement said. "By investigating all options in detail, we hope to provide a long-term solution that will address the community's ongoing transport needs."
