M1 talks well on road
THE state and federal governments have started talks to resolve the $2 billion M1 upgrade dispute, but don’t expect an agreement this year.
After a week of tough talk, Main Roads Minister Mark Bailey and Federal Infrastructure Minister Paul Fletcher met yesterday to discuss further work on the state’s busiest road.
Both came out of the meeting saying talks were “constructive”.
Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull last week committed $1 billion to widen the M1 between Varsity and Tugun and at the Gateway merge between Eight Mile Plains and Daisy Hill.
He said he would include the money in next month’s federal budget, but only if the State Government matched it.
Opposition Leader Bill Shorten later matched Mr Turnbull’s promise to tip in $1 billion.
However, the State Government wants to contribute only 20 per cent of the total cost.
Both tiers of government last year agreed to $500 million of work to upgrade the M1 between Mudgeeraba and Varsity Lakes and at the Gateway merge.
Work on the former started yesterday.
Mr Bailey revealed the State was working on a business case to widen the Pacific Motorway between Varsity Lakes and Tugun. It is scheduled to be completed by December.
While no funding agreement has been reached for the newly mooted upgrades, confidence is growing that work will begin in midlate 2020.
“Absolutely (we are much closer to an agreement than we were this time last week),” Mr Bailey said. “The business cease will be done by the end of the year and we are already underway with it.
‘The business case looks in detail at what’s involved in terms of a project, gets into the technics of it and you end up with a much more detailed estimate to provide scope for people to tender.”
Mr Fletcher said he was looking forward to receiving the State’s business case.
“This is a sophisticated piece of modelling — a lot of economic and engineering analysis and this will come to the Commonwealth government for assessment by Infrastructure Australia to give their formal advice,” he said.
“The formal commitment in there, it’s $1 billion across two projects and we need to see the businesses case done.”