The municipal council of Aa en Hunze has reluctantly approved the relocation of the Geelbroekerweg in Geelbroek. The province wants to move the road because it threatens to be flooded several times a year after the implementation of a planned nature project.
The Geelbroekerweg will be moved about two hundred meters to the east. At the place where the road is now, there will be a kind of ditch where water can flow if the water level is too high.
The province of Drenthe wants to create wet nature in the area around Geelbroek. This should prevent the soil from becoming too dry in the future. In addition to Geelbroek, parts of Eleveld, Ekehaar, Hooghalen and Graswijk also fall within the area.
By rewetting the soil, the Geelbroekerweg would be flooded in wetter periods. The province has therefore applied for a permit from Aa and Hunze to move the road.
Farmers in the area are not happy with the province’s plans. For more than ten years there has been a discussion between the farmers and the provincial government about the nature project.
The farmers fear that their agricultural land will also become much wetter, so that they can use their land less often.
So far there is no solution that satisfies both the farmers and the province. “The process is very slow,” says farmer Sjaak van Essen from Eleveld.
“There was a proposal that would not affect anyone and some farmers would even benefit from it, but Prolander (the provincial landscape manager, ed.) has pressed the pause to wait for new nature rules.”
Fellow farmer and fellow villager Evert Smeenge agrees. “We just haven’t heard anything at all, actually not since January. Commissioner Jumelet has ordered a voluntary plot exchange to be started, but it just doesn’t happen,” says Smeenge frustrated.
That frustration carries over to the city council. It is difficult for Councilor Greet Oosterhuis of Municipal Interests to accept that there had been no contact between the farmers and the province for months. “We find this course of action inappropriate. We agree with the plan, but with great reluctance.”
Blocking the permit would probably only cause skewed faces at the provincial government and an objection procedure that Aa and Hunze will lose. According to the municipality, the permit application for relocating the road is in order.
A bitter message for the farmers, who hoped that the city council would stop the plans to move the road, in order to make a statement to the provincial government.
However, the council members agree to move the road. Although in many cases that is not very welcome.