Queensland inland road network upgrade
Deteriorating roads and bridges in regional Queensland are increasing travel times, vehicle operating costs and safety risks. Flooding is also an issue for many of these roads.
Key routes affected by these issues include:
- The Warrego, Landsborough, Flinders, Barkly, Carnarvon, Dawson, Peak Downs and Capricorn highways
- The Kennedy Highway and Developmental Road
- The Gregory Highway and Developmental Road
- The Gulf Developmental Road.
Queensland’s road freight network contains coastal and inland routes, with the inland routes being 10 times longer in total kilometres. In 2016–17, the Queensland freight task was estimated to be 170 billion tonne kilometres, with 65% moved by road. The freight task is projected to grow to over 200 billion tonne kilometres by 2030.
It is likely that growth in population, employment, tourism and freight volumes will exacerbate these safety and capacity issues, resulting in nationally significant productivity losses.
The proposal proposes a strategy that prioritises investment based on the goals of improving productivity and safety on regional Queensland roads, and sustaining regional communities.
The Australian and Queensland Governments have jointly committed $1 billion for upgrades to the Queensland Inland Freight Route, 1,200 kilometres of the Gregory, Carnavon and Dawson Highways between Charters Towers in central-northern Queensland to Mungindi on the Queensland-NSW border.
The proposal includes improvements to address safety, surface issues, flooding, bridge strength and width, road alignments, widening and pavement sealing.
This proposal originated from a detailed submission by Regional Development Australia (RDA) Townsville and North West Queensland as the Secretariat of the Inland Queensland Roads Action Project, on behalf of all 34 funding partners, including 28 local governments, 5 RDA Committees and the Royal Automobile Club of Queensland.
This proposal calls for program submissions that consider road safety improvements at a jurisdictional and potentially local level.
We encourage relevant organisations to fully assess this problem in their respective locality (Stage 1 of Infrastructure Australia’s Assessment Framework) prior to identifying and analysing potential investment options (Stage 2 of Infrastructure Australia’s Assessment Framework).
Refer to Infrastructure Glossary for terms and definitions.