Records of rival parties on transport worth close look

THE LNP claim they will “fasttrack” the M2.

The LNP’s secretly appointed candidate for Currumbin declares the M2 is “a priority for the southern Gold Coast” when that road will end in Nerang!

When it comes to the M2 (and the M1), Gold Coasters should examine the records of Labor and the LNP.

LNP – 2012-2015 (under Campbell Newman)

●Cut the M2 from key planning documents

●Not a single new dollar spent on M1 upgrades

●Cut more than $600 million from Queensland’s roads budget

●Sacked 14,000 workers – including more than 700 RoadTek roadbuilders.

Labor – 2015-present (under Annastacia Palaszczuk)

●Secured more than $2.3 billion in joint funding for four M1 upgrades (which will create more than 2000 jobs)

●M1 – Mudgeeraba to Varsity Lakes upgrade almost done

●M1 – Varsity Lakes to Tugun upgrade, early works started

●M1 – M3/Gateway merge upgrade almost done

●M1 – Eight Mile Plains to Daisy Hill starting soon

●M1 – Exit 54 (Coomera) upgrade completed in 2016

●M1 – Exit 57 (Oxenford) upgrade, work under way

●M1 – Exit 41 (Yatala) upgrade, construction to start this year

●M1 – Exit 49 (Pimpama), business case under way

●M1 – Exit 45 (Ormeau) in planning stage

●M1 – Exit 38 (Yatala North) in planning stage

●M2 (Coomera Connector), resurrected the project by preserving land for it, completed early consultation, started geotech surveys, business case.

In that same period, Labor built the 7.3km light rail extension from Helensvale to the Gold Coast University Hospital.

Labor also completed planning and locked in funding to build the next stage of light rail from Broadbeach to Burleigh.

Three new train stations will be built in the coming years at Pimpama, Helensvale North and Merrimac for Cross River Rail.

These are the facts of Labor’s transport investment record on the Gold Coast.

Beyond the LNP’s slogans and rhetoric is a real plan for pain that Queenslanders still remember – cuts to services, sacking workers and selling public assets.