Summernats car festival: Canberrans vent frustrations about noise, sexual harassment on social media

Updated

Canberrans have taken to social media to vent their frustrations about the Summernats 2015 car festival, describing noise pollution, sexual harassment and anti-social behaviour from patrons.

But despite numerous negative comments online, members of a nearby residents association said they had little to complain about following this year's event, which wrapped up on Sunday afternoon.

Featuring burnout competitions, cruising events, fireworks and the Miss Summernats beauty competition, the annual four-day festival was expected to attract about 100,000 car-loving petrolheads to Exhibition Park in Canberra's north.

Police and the ACT Government have been broadly supportive of the car show throughout this year's event.

But on Twitter many in Canberra were less than impressed.

One resident in Watson, a suburb adjacent to the venue at Mitchell, recorded the sound from her home and tweeted a complaint to the ACT's Deputy Chief Minister Simon Corbell.

Mr Corbell responded to the tweet, acknowledging the event was a noisy one.

"Acknowledge it's a noisy event for brief period each year. Noise monitored by EPA and any breaches of authorisations acted on," he said.

On Friday, another Canberra resident described seeing hundreds of Summernats attendees on Lonsdale Street in Braddon, some of whom he claimed jumped on the roofs of used cars at a dealership.

There were also reports of other antisocial behaviour, including sexual harassment and threatening driving from festival participants in Canberra's city.

'It's been pretty good this year'

Despite the barrage of negative comments online, committee members from the Watson Community Association said although the event was still noisy, they had few complaints to make this year.

"I think it's been really good. The big issues for us obviously are the pollution from the burnouts, litter and to a certain extent antisocial behaviour. We haven't had any real dramas with the antisocial behaviour, or parking. I think it's been well run and well organised," committee member Ros Lestone said.

In previous years the association has made complaints about burnt rubber from the burnout competition being cast over homes in the area.

But Mr Lestone said this year Watson residents had been lucky as smoke from the burnouts had been blown towards Dickson and Downer rather than their suburb.

"The noise has been bearable ... but you sort of get used to it after a while," he said.

"From a resident's perspective we're kind of used to it ... it's been pretty good this year."

The association's deputy chairman Richard Lester said although guests at his home had been woken by fireworks in the early hours of Sunday morning, he would not be making a complaint either this year.

Summernats co-owner Andy Lopez said there had been been "really good" crowd behaviour throughout the event.

"The police have given us a pretty good report so far and had no serious incidents of any kind," he said.

"That's of great credit to crowd given the high temperatures that we've experienced as well."

On Sunday a police spokeswoman was unable to discuss complaints or charges relating to Summernats in detail.

She said an official statement outlining police activity at the event would be issued on Monday.

Topics: carnivals-and-festivals, social-media, canberra-2600

First posted