Traffic delays from Hale Street project
From tomorrow morning commuters will find they cannot right-turn from the Hale Street section of the Inner City Bypass onto Coronation Drive for about 18 months while the bridge is under construction and then be restricted to one right-turn lane after that.
RACQ’s general manager for external relations, Gary Fites, said traffic disruption and delays from the changes would only worsen once school holidays ended later this month, with the worst effects to be felt once universities resumed a month later.
“The Brisbane City Council itself concedes that, despite some traffic engineering changes in the immediately affected area, the right-turn closure at this key intersection will increase congestion and delays, not only on the Inner City Bypass but also on other roads in the surrounding suburbs, including the already busy Milton and Musgrave Roads,” Mr Fites said.
“Tellingly, while the Council is advising motorists who usually make the right turn into Coronation Drive from Hale Street to ‘find alternative routes’, it can offer no advice as what those alternatives might be.
“In the absence of that, the best advice RACQ can offer is to trial a few alternatives before schools resume again, bearing in mind that the extra traffic generated when schools and universities resume may well necessitate a further review of route options.”
Mr Fites said the construction-generated delays would be tolerable if there were a reasonable prospect of reduced congestion when the Hale Street Link was completed.
“Unfortunately, once construction is completed the right-turn capacity from Hale Street to Coronation Drive will be halved from two lanes to one.
“That’s likely to ensure ongoing congestion on the Inner City Bypass, significantly negating any benefit the completed toll bridge might offer to motorists.
“Despite having repeatedly warned of these types of consequences from building a bridge at a location that reduces the capacity of one of Brisbane’s busiest intersections, the RACQ can only hope – for motorists’ sakes – that our worst fears are not realised.
“Meanwhile, given the State Government’s own strong misgivings over the impact on the surrounding roads of building a new bridge at that particular location, the Government should more firmly exercise in future the appropriate powers at its disposal to intervene at the planning and design stages of such projects to maximise benefits to the transport network, both during and after construction.”
