[COM] South Road Superway | $842m | 3km

[Aidan]

sorry I meant the Northern Expressway

you are right thought, Governments should been pouring money into infrastructure - but they won't

If track record's anything to go by, that's true.

and they can't.

False.

Our big hope is Abbott getting superfunds to invest in it.

Then we're totally screwed

Not only would it be incredibly difficult to get legislation through parliament forcing superfunds to do anything at all, but any sentence that starts with Our big hope is Abbott... is an oxymoron. Except perhaps if the next word is losing, but Rudd's not showing much sign of big hope either.

[Waewick]

by can't I mean the electorate probably won't allow it.

I don't really care who is in charge, all I know is he has flagged the desire to get superfund money in.

peoples personal opinion of him doesn't really change that.

[claybro]

Just a couple of things from previous posts. There seems to be a miss-conception that the applied toll will pay for a particular road in its entirety. That is not the intention. Not anywhere. Tolls do not pay in full for roads in a given period of time. It just provides an alternative consistent revenue stream to allow for some creative accounting, borrowing, shifting of assets from public to private and back again over many decades. Toll tunnels and toll roads themselves, have resulted in some massive losses, but somehow they continue to be built, so if it is tolls the Federal Government want in order to provide us with decent roads, then tolls they should get.

With regard to the South Road corridor, and the potential for a tollway, given the current designs, it would appear entirely possible to toll the whole length, as the freeway style corridor is being built adjacent to South road, in a trench, leaving the surface road as a service road, complete with traffic lights, crossings and local access for free use of those not in a hurry, or not wanting to pay a toll. Just toll the trench lanes below. A win, win as far as I am concerned.

With regard to the Superway, ditto. There is a roadway underneath the superway which will allow traffic not to have to use the Superway. There is ample room from Regency road to the Superway, to separate traffic lanes so local traffic does not have to enter the superway near the golf course. There is already a separate service road on the eastern side which could remain free. This whole section could then be tolled as well.

Same applies for the Northern Connector. Port Wakefield road would be a perfectly acceptable viable free alternative.

Anyone worried about traffic volumes on Pt Wakefield road not being sufficient to feed the tollway, well at times in the AM and PM this road is a carpark, and I would assume the volume using the new connector even if tolled would suffice.

[Dog]

In regard to infrastructure
Having already accumulated a massive $1.7 trillion since the introduced compulsory super, Australia now has an incredibly strong financial services industry and with compulsory super rising from 9% to 12% we will see even more rapid growth.

I don't favour too much government interference in this investment but I do wonder where the $1.7 trillion has actually been invested. I would hate to see it all in US government bonds to prop up their debt when foreigners are seeing the opportunity to investing in our oil, gas, coal, farms, infrastructure, and so on. I see we have an opportunity to buy back the farm here and actually build some decent infrastructure.

When I look around the world and at the dismal state of Europe, the astronomical US Debt, our potential and our location on the edge of Asia, I can't really think of a better place to invest.

[claybro]

In regard to infrastructure
Having already accumulated a massive $1.7 trillion since the introduced compulsory super, Australia now has an incredibly strong financial services industry and with compulsory super rising from 9% to 12% we will see even more rapid growth.

I don't favour too much government interference in this investment but I do wonder where the $1.7 trillion has actually been invested. I would hate to see it all in US government bonds to prop up their debt when foreigners are seeing the opportunity to investing in our oil, gas, coal, farms, infrastructure, and so on. I see we have an opportunity to buy back the farm here and actually build some decent infrastructure.

When I look around the world and at the dismal state of Europe, the astronomical US Debt, our potential and our location on the edge of Asia, I can't really think of a better place to invest.

So what you are really talking about is government bonds then? A guaranteed return for an invested amount for the government to use for a specific purpose ie infrastructure or war? The general population does not hear to much about bonds these days, but whatever happened to AussieBonds, and SAFA bonds from the 80's? I thought they were a good idea.

[Dog]

Claybro
Hi Mate, just saying $1.7 trillion is a huge national assist, defiantly don't want it tied up in Government hands, but it would be a shame if we are investing the bulk of if OS when others are seeing the profit in buying up the farm here and picking the eyes out of our assist.

[Aidan]

So what you are really talking about is government bonds then? A guaranteed return for an invested amount for the government to use for a specific purpose ie infrastructure or war? The general population does not hear to much about bonds these days, but whatever happened to AussieBonds, and SAFA bonds from the 80's? I thought they were a good idea.

SAFA bonds are still around. I assume AussieBonds are the ones issued by the Federal government. If so, they're still around but they no longer need marketing, as supply is limited and there's a huge demand from banks.

[Amused]

I take the Northern Connector [expressway] occasionally, can't say I have ever been on there when there is more than 20 or so cars.

I agree and that is my point exactly. I occasionally take the expressway for the novelty value but it doesn't cut any time off my trip because of the large eastern detour. And I too rarely witness much more than a handful of vehicles on it at any one time. I just don't see that sort of usage as justification of a toll road for the connector. People will argue that they coped without it before, and they can cope without it again.
That's not to say that the connector won't be useful as a free road especially for freight. But as a toll road it will be superfluous. People will go around it.

Also rubberman you said much more clearly what I was trying to say. To toll South Road is to remove a road the taxpayer has already bought and paid for, leaving them without an appropriate alternative nor the original make-do situation.

[claybro]

Also rubberman you said much more clearly what I was trying to say. To toll South Road is to remove a road the taxpayer has already bought and paid for, leaving them without an appropriate alternative nor the original make-do situation

But the road the taxpayer has funded will still be there for free use by every motorist, in all its glorious stop start traffic light controlled, side street accessing mess it is now. Going by the impressions released so far for the Torrens section, it will still be entirely possible to travel along South road on the surface for the its length, separate from the free flowing section in the trench. It is the duplicated, free flowing corridor along/under/over, that could be considered as a tollway, provided the construction of such sections no longer comes exclusively from the taxpayer. Unfortunately, due to the ad-hoc construction of this corridor, this is becoming less of an option.
As for the Northern expressway, I think you will find that once it connects with a Northern connector and therefore the Superway and South road it will get much more use. It was never designed with commuter traffic in mind, but it will in future take the pressure off Pt Wakefield Road for commuters as commercial transport will seek the fastest route along the connector. Not to mention, Pt Wakefield road will be swamped by an extra 30000 residents about to lob in the area.

[rev]

There may not be that much traffic on the northern expressway at the moment, but the northern connector will run through a region that will be turned into housing in the coming decades. From the Dry Creek salt pans all the way up to just past Virginia and near Two Wells which is north of the start of the northern expressway.

There may not be enough volume of traffic coming off the northern expressway now to justify a toll, but when you have tens of thousands of extra vehicles up there, there probably will be a case for it.

[neoballmon]

I take the Northern Connector occasionally, can't say I have ever been on there when there is more than 20 or so cars.

I went along the Northern Expressway today, whole length from Port Wakefield Road to Main North Road, and I counted about 120 cars travelling in the opposite direction. So I don't think that's too bad for a weekend.

Say about 70 of these continued onto the Northern Connector as a toll way, $3 average toll, that's $210 from 10 minutes worth of traffic. So maybe $15,000 per day. Approx $5.5M over a year.

[Norman]

The DPTI reports that an average of 10,500 cars use the western end of the Northern Expressway in both directions on a daily basis. 2050 of these vehicles are classed as heavy vehicles.

[Amused]

I hear what you're saying. I do.
From my perspective, I will unlikely need to use it often but even if I did live in a position that would require a daily toll, the price would be irrelevant for me. I'm saying that simply to say I'm not against south road as a toll road because it will effect me personally at all.
But I just see it as the wrong side of cheeky, if not downright rude for a Government to toll infrastructure that should have been upgraded or at least planned and budgeted to be upgraded years ago, to buy itself out of years of shoddy management. I think it is doing wrong by those expected to use that infrastructure. Toll roads should be a bonus for those who can use them, to take strain off existing infrastructure, not a detriment for those who would otherwise have to use it as it has always been their regular route.
If they wanted to parallel the O-bahn with a toll road for example, you better believe I will be signing on the dotted line for an e-tag most gladly. I say again, toll roads as additional to existing infrastructure, great. Toll roads to replace existing infrastructure, absolutely wrong.

Lastly, whilst I too have seen the torrens plan and also note that it will still be possible to parallel the toll road, it would be highly unlikely that for the duration of the corridor that to avoid the would-be toll way, it would not detriment the existing commuter at all. All it takes is one off ramp to be a single lane and you've already lost an originally bought and paid for two lane carriage way. I'd be interested to see the avoidance options for the Northern most segment of the superway for example should it be tolled. My point again is simply that the north/south corridor should be absolutely, unequivocally either untouched and paralleled or upgraded and left untolled. As we've already began messing with South Road, the latter is in my opinion the right option. Maybe not right fiscally, but right morally by the voters/tax payers. It's probably one of the few matters that I sway toward the more socialist side of the fence.

[ml69]

Can somebody please explain why we need to spend $1.1B on a rolls royce Northern Connector when you could spend around half of that upgrading Port Wakefield Rd to 3+3 lane expressway standard with overpasses etc? And get EXACTLY the same capacity?

Yes I know there are a several businesses which currently enter off Pt Wakefield Rd but these can be accommodated with service lane access on the side (Pt Wakefield Rd is wide enough). Pacific Motorway in Qld does this.

Then there is more money available to be spent where it is really needed ... South Rd between Regency Rd to Darlington.

Am I missing something really obvious?

[claybro]

Can somebody please explain why we need to spend $1.1B on a rolls royce Northern Connector when you could spend around half of that upgrading Port Wakefield Rd to 3+3 lane expressway standard with overpasses etc? And get EXACTLY the same capacity?

I initially wondered the same thing but then heard about plans for this area. It is envisaged in the area immediately adjacent to Pt Wakefield Road alone there will be an additional 30000 residents in the next 20 odd years in soon to be constructed new suburbs. None of these suburbs will be connected to a rail corridor. Widening Pt Wakefield to 3 lanes might cater for this extra commuter traffic-just- but there is also an expected explosion in the amount of freight in this time frame as well. We often dis the state government for not planning ahead with infrastructure, but I think in this area, they are doing the right thing for the future.