M1 BAND-AID FIX AN INSULT
THE M1 is choking to death. Yesterday Prime Minister Scott Morrison gave it a Band-Aid.
On a side road in Yatala, the PM was with Forde LNP MP Bert van Manen. The seat is among the most marginal in Australia, the southern tip reaching the Coomera River.
At times the PM was difficult to hear as just 300m away, the truckies on the congested northern highway lanes heading to Brisbane blasted off their horns.
Quickly arranged and with little warning, Mr Morrison announced a $50 million funding injection for the Coast section of the M1 as part of a $130 million road upgrade package for southeast Queensland.
Exit 41 at Yatala and Exit 49 at Pimpama, both in Forde, both among the state’s fastest-growing areas, will be upgraded. The rest will help fix roads in Brisbane, in marginal electorates.
In June last year, the Bulletin asked Gold Coasters about the issues they rated the most important and impacted on their daily lives. Their response was as loud and clear as the truckies’ horns.
They rated the M1 a shocking road, complained about being stuck in traffic several times a week and when caught waiting on off-ramps, they feared for their lives.
Nearly 80 per cent of residents surveyed considered the Pacific Highway between Brisbane and the Coast a “bad or extremely bad road”.
The Commonwealth and the State, at the time, had funded a $2 billion plan to widen the highway. Work on the Gateway merge and between Mudgeeraba and Reedy Creek has begun.
But transport experts back then warned of a dire need to make off-ramps safer and more effective.
Respected engineer and businessman John Howe spoke of a “fundamental” engineering issue with the M1’s on and off-ramps and called for uniform planning.
“What needs to happen is a holistic view of the whole network. Not just on bits and pieces,” he said. “The greatest example is the Story Bridge in Brisbane. In the 1940s they spent the money and built the extra lanes. They were not needed then, but they had the foresight to see what would be needed in the future. Whereas we go through in patches and then need to go back to do more.”
Just how massive that increase in population will be can now be determined.
Treasury figures provided to all councillors this week predict the Coast’s population will reach one million by 2045.
The city is predicted to grow by 14,670 people annually for the next 25 years, up from the average 10,000 per year. Most of the new arrivals will be living at Coomera and Pimpama. Near the exits.
So this is a repair job beyond a BandAid. It needs Commonwealth, State and council co-operation, all our best traffic thinkers thinking together.
Exactly a year ago angry councillors returning to work vented about traffic congestion, and began organising a transport briefing with MPs to reach agreement on how to fix the gridlocked road network.
Nothing ever happened. All of this is an insult to Gold Coasters. All levels of government need to step up and show some political leadership.