Save Hawthorne Park group in Surrey takes its message to City Hall

Dozens of people who are opposed to a plan to build a road through a popular Surrey park descended on City Hall Friday afternoon to deliver a petition with more than 12,000 signatures.

The group sang Oh Canada in the city clerk's office as members loaded box after box of signed electoral response forms onto the counter.

"I'm really pleased with what we did," said Steven Pettigrew with Save Hawthorne Park.

"We are not stopping. We are continuing to collect these forms."

The city plans to build a two-lane road through Hawthorne Park near 104 Avenue and 140 Street to better connect the city centre area to the Guildford neighbourhood.

To stop the project, the group had to use the Alternate Approval Process. It was given 30 days to collect more than 30,000 signed forms in opposition to the road.

Save Hawthorne Park members held rallies and demonstrations and recruited environmentalist David Suzuki to speak at one of their events but the group fell about 18,000 signatures short of its goal.

Pettigrew says there are still plenty of opportunities to put pressure on council to reconsider the proposal.

"If they still don't listen to us, we're not going to stop," he said.

"We're going into an election time and if they have any aspirations of being re-elected, they need to stop this now."