Commenting on the story: Bowden residents irate over lack of essential services 

I agree completely. I have been living in Bowden for almost five years. We have lots of things that attract people to Bowden but in reality it’s a hard place to live.

There is no parking available for people with two cars, and only one apartment parking space. What parking there is, is a maximum of three hours at all times, so if you can manage to find a park within five blocks of your home, you can’t stay there long.

There are too many trees lining the streets and in the middle of the streets that cause issues for cars and trucks and take up precious car parking space for residents. Renewal SA made all sorts of promises but haven’t delivered on many.

The locals aren’t the ones using the bars etc, that’s visitors. The locals want things like a barber, chemist, doctor, dentist etc. Not expensive boutique bars and plant shops no one can afford to buy from.

Residents also want adequate parking for residents. At the very least stickers for our cars so we don’t get fined every two hours for parking on our own street. The council is making a killing from parking tickets, and the cars that are parking illegally due to a lack of adequate car parks cause even more issues in the streets for residents.

It’s really poorly done. I’ve been complaining for years and the stock standard answer from Renewal SA is Bowden was planned as a car-free suburb. The reality is that is not what happened, and it’s the residents who pay the price for poor planning. – Tammy Walters

Commenting on the story: BoM criticised for Queensland rain forecasts

A few comments from “the horse’s mouth”, as it were. I relocated to Port Douglas three years ago from Adelaide and have lived through the last week being amazed by what I have seen.

We had no power for seven days, it came back on Tuesday. Fortunately one of the first things we invested in when we moved up here was a generator which kept the essentials going. The cyclone itself was easy compared to the rain of biblical proportions that followed.

We are lucky we are on the side of the hill and only lost half our garden; many people, especially in Mossman, are severely flooded. SES and electrical and water providers have been working tirelessly to restore services and deserve the highest praise.

As a water scientist who has spent time assessing grant applications that deal with predicting storm and rain burst events, I can tell you that an enormous amount of computing power goes into attempting to predict what are essentially “chaotic” events. We need to remember that BoM predicted the path and intensity of the cyclone pretty well perfectly, enabling preparations for the event – so well done. The fact that the cyclone liked the far north so much it decided to hang around was beyond the capabilities of current predictions to accurately estimate.

And a final perspective for you – in just one day here we had more than Adelaide’s entire annual rainfall. The week’s event yielding over 2 metres of rain, a new record. The saddest thing is that we can’t capture some of it and send it down to you guys! – Christopher Saint

Commenting on the story: Turkish Airlines wins more Australian flights 

We outliers in Adelaide – population 1.4 million in case Qantas is unaware – have zero direct QF flights anywhere (and I ignore Jetstar to Bali).

My wife and I are Gold QF Frequent Flyers but if we want to travel internationally with Qantas, we have to go via Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane or Perth, adding to travel time and inconvenience. This has been going on for about 10 years.

Qatar is servicing Adelaide well so long as you want to travel via Qatar to Europe etc, but not anywhere closer or even South Africa, USA etc. But Qatar has been prevented from adding flights to Australia, a brilliant piece of market monopoly by Qantas. Singapore Airlines and Malaysia Airlines too have good connections, but why is Qantas ignoring Adelaide?

Qantas is a disgrace in the way it treats Adelaide. – Chris Bowman

Great to see more competition for Qantas but would be nice if Turkish could fly a couple of flights a week out of Adelaide. The service and safety record is second to none. (While we are at it, would like to see Singapore Airlines bring on Premium Economy on the Adelaide flights!) – Peter Jackson