The North East Link

For the freeway/tunnel/viaduct to proceed, changes to our landscape may include: Acquisition of Watsonia Barracks land  Installation of sound walls along Greensborough Road from the Western Ring Road to Lower Plenty Road  Possible interference with land at Heide Museum of Modern Art at the tunnel exit points at Manningham Road  Likely loss of current parkland and damage to the same caused by 'staging areas' for tunnel construction at the entry and exit points of the tunnel  Interchanges that will have to built at each end to allow entry and exit points from the tunnel/freeway  Land acquisitions and sound walls along Bulleen Road  Fly overs along above ground sections of freeway (Greensborough Road and Bulleen Road)

 

2011 Victorian Melways showing the route of the North-East Link freeway

 

 

 

Information sourced via Freedom of Information (F.O.I.) about the North-East Link
This information was requested by Friends of Banyule from the relevant authorities including VicRoads and the Linking Melbourne Authority, but was withheld...

"North East Link - Infrastructure Australia : Reform and Investment Framework"  North East Link Stage 1 - 6  [ PDF ]

Also below is the Map acquired via F.O.I. including possible locations of the proposed interchanges

 

Criticism of the North-East Link 
source : Wikipedia

Project opponents claim that there are several disadvantages:

• The project will serve largely as a freight connection to the south east and will have minimal impact on the congestion of local roads.^[2]
• Freight will continue to congest local roads, as the current freight passing through local roads does so to avoid tolled roads such as CityLink. Therefore a private public partnership building a tolled solution will not solve the current congestion issues.
• The freeway will split Maclead and Watsonia in two.Proposed Route
• The freeway is likely to divide the local community and result in local residents having difficulty in accessing public services and amenities such as schools, shops and transport (eg; Eastern Freeway/Burnley Tunnel).
• The freeway will interference with the Yarra River parkland and splitting the parkland in two.
• Without the East-West road connection the proposal will increase congestion at Hoddle Street.
• Alternative proposed routes were avoided as these routes passed through marginal electorates.

As a public private funding partnership is unlikely to be a viable option, it is more likely that the Government will have to fund this road project. In addition, tunnel will cost close to one billion dollars per kilometre to build.

The freeway is planned to have on and off ramps constructed in built-up areas near Bulleen, Viewbank and Greensborough.^[3]

The state government of Victoria plans to use the recently invented act to bypass local objections to the freeway. The Major Transport Projects Facilitation Act 2009 overrides local councils existing rights to court objections to big projects. ^[4]

There is debate over the efficacy of this transport solution. The project will require a trade-off between environmental and sustainability objectives, compared with increased road traffic.

With this in mind it is worth noting that:

The Banyule Flats, the Warringal Parklands and the Yarra Corridor (the areas to be affected by the proposed freeway, tunnel or viaduct) are one the last unaltered natural areas in the inner North East. As such they are important habitat and are extensively used for recreation.

The areas also hold national, international and historical significance as the birthplace of the Heidelberg School, the first important art movement in Australia featuring works by Tom Roberts, Arthur Streeton, Frederick McCubbin, Walter Withers, Jane Sutherland, Charles Conder and Louis Abrahams. The Museum of Contemporary Art, Heide is located within the proposed roadway area.

The Banyule City Council recently tabled a proposal to have the Banyule Flats, the Warringal Parklands and the Yarra Corridor made into a Heritage listed area.

 

Proposed Freeway Route

Melbourne 2040 Road Plans Map    [ PDF download ]  Zoom-in for a more detailed view of this map once downloaded.

This map is referenced from an article in THE AGE | Plans for hundreds of kilometres of new freeways | October 11, 2010  |  Clay Lucas

HUNDREDS of kilometres of new freeways and expanded roads would be built across Melbourne over the next 30 years, under plans revealed in a highly detailed government map obtained by The Age.    Read more ... >

 

Friends of Banyule NE Link Map

Click on the following link for a printable copy of the Friends of Banyule map.  This map has been shown at our meetings and has been developed based on the GHD Report commissioned by the Victorian State Government.

 

The route has been based on the GHD Report & discussions with the 'Linking Melbourne Authority' - formerly South Eastern Integrated Transport Authority (S.E.I.T.A.).

 

Additional information on expected location of 'interchanges' along the route has been sourced through Freedom of Information (FOI).  See map below for a representation of the location of the interchanges that are expected to be built.

 

 

GHD Report Map

Below is the map from the GHD Report - which was commissionsed by the Labor government and released in 2008.  The entire  GHD Report is available in PDF format for download.  [Note the file size = 13.81 MB]

 

VicRoads references the North-East link 'Connector'

Click on the following link for a fact sheet from the Victorian Government Transport Plan which references the North-East 'Connector'

Click on the following link for a copy of the Victorian Government Transport Plan map of the proposed North-East link

The Brumby Government advised in its state election accouncement that it is spending $15.4 Million on scoping this project and defining the alignment for the route. No firm committment of the exact location of the freeway from either VicRoads, the Linking Melbourne Authority, Victorian Department of Transport, nor our politicians has been provided.

This means that there are a number of available options for the route of proposed freeway/tunnel/viaduct.  Land/house acquisitions within a wide band of land to either side of the large 'red dots' are therefore not out of the question.  

Friends of Banyule will continue to seek clarification of the route from the relevant authorities however, we are well aware that one of their strategies would be to not disclose the exact route, nor to propose alternatives too early in their project, as this gives the community less time to mount any protest.

 

The Melways 2010 references the North-East Link freeway

Below is a snapshot from the map that appears in the latest edition of the Melways

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