Opinion
Fix local roads first, to dodge the infrastructure potholes
Taxpayers would get better bang for their buck if the federal government spent an extra $1 billion on improving our local roads rather than on building new megaprojects in the major cities.
Marion TerrillInfrastructure and transport expertIf you’ve had to swerve around a gaping pothole recently, or found yourself skidding on a crumbling road edge, you may have wondered: when on earth is someone going to fix this? The answer to that question is, unfortunately, probably not as soon as you’d like – not unless federal and state governments commit to significant changes to the way they fund local road maintenance.
More than 75 per cent of Australia’s roads are managed by councils. These are the sealed and unsealed roads that link homes and businesses to the arterials, corridors, and freeways of the road network.
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