Traffic was brought to a standstill on Monday morning as police evicted one of the last residents of the Northbourne public housing flats.
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Judith Kelly, 58, lived in a ground floor unit with her son and briefly staged an impromptu protest in the middle of Northbourne Avenue after her eviction.
Dramatic photos showed the busy northbound lane of Northbourne grinding to a halt as Ms Kelly blocked the path of oncoming traffic.
She was later led off the street by a police officer.
Ms Kelly’s eviction captures the difficulties faced by tenants and authorities as the government overhauls its stock of public housing.
Housing ACT executive director Louise Gilding has previously said Ms Kelly and her son had been offered seven separate properties, and refused them all.
She said there was a significant history to the case, which she could not share for privacy reasons, but she said Housing ACT had gone out of its way to help the pair.
“We have succesfully relocated over 500 tenants as part of the public housing renewal program," she said.
“We are very disappointed that we haven’t been able to find a suitable property for this tenant.”
The Northbourne flats have been pegged for re-development since June 2017, and the ACT government recently issued a tender to have the block Ms Kelly lives in demolished.
It could cost as much as $4.3 million to knock down the dilapidated apartments, which straddle Northbourne Avenue at Braddon and Turner.
In April the government also lodged plans to demolish the Stuart Flats, a large public housing block in Griffith, at an estimated cost of $4.2 million.
Homelessness and the lack of affordable housing are growing issues in the ACT.
A recent study by the Productivity Commission showed more than 1000 people in need of accommodation had been turned away by ACT authorities last year.
Emergency housing shelters have blamed the relocation of public housing tenants for a spike in the number of homeless seeking help.