It is now over 15 months since the RTA provided its Environmental Assessment of the Tintenbar to Ewingsdale upgrade for public scrutiny as well as for review by the Department of Planning. In May last year it also provided to Planning its assessment of the hundreds of public comments on its Environmental Assessment.
We are advised that highway construction is expected to begin by late 2011 and be completed by late 2014, weather permitting. However, this schedule is dependent upon approval by the Department and Minister for Planning. According to an RTA spokesperson the project is still being assessed by the Department of Planning, although various documents suggest that RTA expected approval for the T2E in December 2009. Notwithstanding the long approval process, the RTA spokesperson advised that to date around $17 million has been used for land acquisition along the preferred route. The Tintenbar to Ewingsdale upgrade is jointly funded by the NSW State and Federal governments and is part of the $3.6 billion Pacific Highway upgrade.
The other burning road issue is, of course, the proposed southern bypass of Bangal
ow. Again, details about the assessment and decision process, and how the Minister for Roads is to be advised by RTA remain very limited. But we are advised that a final decision on the bypass feasibility is expected to be made in the very near future. Given that ‘feasibility’ is an early stage of the planning and construction process, it would seem that the decision on whether to actually fund and build a southern bypass is still some months, or more probably years, away.
Tony Hart