Roads Australia
The NSW Government’s plans to combat urban congestion have come in for criticism in the Sydney Morning Herald over the past fortnight.
In a series of separate reports, the Herald last week criticised the Government’s planning to reduce long-term car usage, questioned the viability of the $12 billion north west metro line, and cited from an independent report claiming the proposed M4 East extension will result in city-wide gridlock unless it is accompanied by higher tolls and a tax on parking.
Today’s Herald is also critical of the Government’s $48 million upgrade of Spit and Mosman roads (see story below),
In other news, the Daily Telegraph reported last week that the State Government was considering a ban on container trucks on motorways during peak hours in a bid to ease congestion.
In Brisbane, the Courier Mail said the State Government’s $267 million contribution to the AirPort Link project represented a “$220 million blowout”, a claim denied by Deputy Premier, Paul Lucas, in the same report. Mr Lucas told the Mail the project represented exceptional value for the Queensland taxpayer.
In Melbourne, the Herald Sun reported this week that the Victorian Government was investigating the possibility of expanding the network for B-triple trucks.
Meantime a report in last week's Herald Sun said VicRoads was investigating expanding its use of the SCATS traffic light management system in a bid to improve traffic flows.
And the release of the first week’s tolling figures for EastLink is enough for today’s Melbourne Age to all but write off private tollroads.
With first week figures understandably showing a drop off in usage following a four week toll-free period, the Age concluded that the future of private toll roads had been called into question, further evidenced by the problems with Sydney’s Lane Cove and Cross City tunnels.
EastLink operator ConnectEast says the number of average daily trips of 270,868 during the toll-free period indicates the underlying travel demand on the EastLink corridor, and that customer accounts are being opened ahead of expectations, with about 7,000 new accounts set up each week.
In a statement to the ASX, ConnectEast said it was difficult to draw conclusions from such a small sample of first week tolling data, and it would take some time for traffic to ramp-up as motorists modified their driving habits to take account of EastLink’s integration into the road network.
John Holland has been selected as the construction partner for the West Gate Bridge Strengthening project.
John Holland will join an alliance of UK design firm the Flint and Neill Partnership, Sinclair Knight Merz and VicRoads to deliver the project.
In announcing the selection last week, Victorian Roads and Ports Minister, Tim Pallas, said strengthening the West Gate Bridge was one of Melbourne’s critical infrastructure projects.
“The West Gate Bridge Strengthening Project is a key component of the $1.4 billion M1 upgrade, which is the largest state funded road project in Victoria’s history. The project will improve safety and reliability, and increase traffic throughput on the state’s busiest freight and traffic corridor,” Mr Pallas said.
“The $240 million project to strengthen the West Gate Bridge will ensure the bridge is able to cater for future traffic volumes and vehicle loads.
“The West Gate Bridge Strengthening Alliance will undertake complex structural analysis, bridge modelling and options development over the next 12 to 14 months, with major construction works on the bridge to commence in mid 2009.”
The NSW Government yesterday moved to alleviate congestion on Sydney’s critical northern arterial corridor with the announcement of a $48 million upgrade of Spit and Military roads.
NSW Roads Minister, Eric Roozendaal, said the upgrade had a major focus on public transport and clearing accidents and breakdowns on the corridor faster.
The 8km long Spit-Military Road corridor is one of Sydney’s busiest bus routes, with over 1400 bus trips carrying 60,000 commuters on a typical weekday.
Mr Roozendaal said the $48 million upgrade followed the recommendations of an inter-agency government working group commissioned to investigate options to improve traffic flows on Spit and Military roads.
Elements of the upgrade include:
Buses on the corridor will also be the first to benefit from a new GPS-based bus priority system aimed at improving bus travel time reliability.
Projects will be delivered over five years, with some commencing immediately pending public consultation.
Roads surrounding EastLink are benefiting from the opening of the new toll road with reduced traffic volumes, Victorian Minister for Roads and Ports, Tim Pallas, said yesterday.
“Analysis shows that Springvale Road and Stud Road are carrying 20 per cent and 25 per cent less traffic than they did before EastLink opened,” the Minister said.
Average mid-week daily traffic volumes at other locations include:
Mr Pallas said these figures provide a snapshot of traffic patterns during the first week of tolling, but there would continue to be fluctuations over coming weeks.
“VicRoads will continue to monitor traffic on the roads surrounding EastLink, adjust traffic signal operation and make changes to traffic signals as needed to meet the changing traffic demand in all directions.”
The $3.4 billion Airport Link project has cleared its final planning hurdle, paving the way for construction to start next month.
Qld Deputy Premier and Minister for Infrastructure and Planning, Paul Lucas, said last week the release of the Queensland Coordinator-General’s Change Report addressed visual, noise and air quality impacts, and traffic and spoil arrangements during construction.
Mr Lucas said the project had also reached financial close with the public contribution remaining substantially under State’s affordability benchmark at $267 million.
“BrisConnections has responded well to the State Government’s call for innovation in this project, which has led to design enhancements and markedly reduced the potential impacts on the community," the Minister said.
On 19 May, the State Government announced that BrisConnections had been chosen to finance, design, construct, own, operate and maintain Airport Link.
BrisConnections will also design and build the next section of the Northern Busway (Windsor to Kedron), and the Airport Roundabout Upgrade that links the East-West Arterial to Airport Drive, before handing the infrastructure back to the State to operate and maintain.
The total worth of the three projects is $4.8 billion. The State’s contribution across the three projects is $1.7 billion.
Meantime, the Queensland Government has this week given the green light to Brisbane City Council’s Hale Street Link after ensuring that vital improvements were made to the project.
Main Roads Minister Warren Pitt said the State Government had secured an outbound viaduct over Coronation Drive and Hale Street intersection to offset impacts on the Riverside Expressway and Pacific Motorway.
Further changes to the project mean that significant impacts on roads during construction will be limited to a four month period between November 2009 and February 2010 instead of up to 15 months under the original council plan.
One of the most innovative and exciting transport projects ever undertaken in South Australia - the Port River Expressway bridges - opened to traffic last weekend.
The twin bridges - road and rail - form the $178 million centrepiece of a revitalised Port Adelaide precinct.
The Port River Expressway links freight entering South Australia's major port and rail terminals directly with the national highways and national rail network servicing Perth, Darwin, Sydney and Melbourne.
A five-kilometre duplicated freeway is already open to traffic while stages two and three consist of the opening road and rail bridges across the Port River.
The road and rail bridges are high-level opening bridges that retain the functionality of the Inner Harbour as an active waterway.
Abigroup’s Southern Region General Manager, Rod Watson, said this week the road bridge was not only a key piece of infrastructure for South Australia, but also of major international engineering significance.
“Completion of this landmark engineering feat, Australia’s first four lane, single leaf highway bascule bridge and one of very few with this design in the world, places South Australia firmly on the international engineering map,” Mr Watson said.
Mr Watson said that working with South Australia’s Department for Transport, Energy and Infrastructure (DTEI) on the project had been a rewarding process.
“Abigroup has had a great start in SA working with the professional team from DTEI. It’s a relationship that I am sure we will both benefit and prosper from in the future”, he said.
Meantime, construction officially commenced last week on South Australia’s largest road project in almost 50 years – the $564 million Northern Expressway.
The construction contract for the project was awarded earlier this year to the Fulton Hogan and York Civil joint venture.
The Northern Expressway will link the upgraded Sturt Highway at the Gawler Bypass with Port Wakefield Road, just north of Waterloo Corner Road.
Construction will commence at the Curtis Road and Angle Vale Road interchanges, with more than 300 people expected to work on the project.
A joint initiative of the Australian and South Australian governments, the Northern Expressway is expected to be completed and open to traffic by December 2010.
The first steps in revitalising South Australia’s public transport network have been taken with the establishment of a project team and a formal Request for Proposals issued for extension of the city tramline to the Adelaide Entertainment Centre.
Following the highly successful extension of Adelaide’s tram network from Victoria Square to City West, Coast to Coast Light Rail Stage 2 – City West to Adelaide Entertainment Centre is the first of Adelaide’s new connections. It is a 2.4 kilometre extension taking the tramline to the future home of Adelaide’s Marjorie Jackson-Nelson Hospital and down Port Road to a redeveloped Adelaide Entertainment Centre.
It will be operational by early to mid 2010.
A formal Request for Proposals is now available, with the State Government inviting suitable and experienced contractors to be involved in delivering the $162 million project to take the tram to Port Road, before later extending it to Port Adelaide and Semaphore.
Having established the link to the Entertainment Centre, instead of running a tramline down the centre of Port Road, hybrid tram-trains will continue to Port Adelaide, Semaphore and West Lakes via the existing Outer Harbor/Grange railway lines.
The extension, as detailed in the recent State Budget, is part of a $2 billion blueprint for public transport in Adelaide over the next decade.
At its heart is electrification of Adelaide’s metropolitan rail system including the Noarlunga, Outer Harbor/Grange and Gawler lines.
The first step in the electrification process is to replace wooden sleepers with the concrete variety. This rail renewal will also take place on the Belair line.
The Government says this will result in faster, more frequent and efficient rail services, while also providing significant economic and environmental benefits.
Elsewhere, funds have been allocated for an extra 80 buses over the next four years – for extra peak train and tram services, for the procurement of additional trams and for a brand new ticketing system.
There is also additional money to refurbish parts of the existing train fleets with an emphasis on addressing the state of windows on many carriages.
Furthermore, the purchase a land corridor between Seaford and Aldinga will facilitate a future extension of rail into Adelaide’s southern regions.
The transport blueprint recognises the long-term needs of Adelaide’s public transport system while also addressing the short term challenges it faces.
A reminder to members that Federal Infrastructure and Transport Minister Anthony Albanese will launch Roads Australia, our new identity, at a gala lunch in Sydney on August 20.
The lunch, sponsored by Pioneer Road Services, will be attended by a who's who of the national industry, including the CEO's of many of ARF's member companies.
Bookings may be made on the Events page of the ARF website.
Submitted by Mark Bowmer on Friday August 8th 2008 10:33am
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