Opinion: Disgraceful M1 the price we pay for electing ineptitude
This government’s inability to plan for the future is exposed in the daily shambles it is to travel the M1, writes Peter Gleeson.
Peter Gleeson
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Another day, another terrible M1 crash where a motorcyclist remains gravely ill in hospital and traffic grinds to a standstill on the southeast’s busiest road.
Thursday’s crash at Oxenford on the Gold Coast has reinforced the need for the Coomera Connector project to be fast-tracked, rather than delayed six months, as we have learned.
The Palaszczuk Government’s penchant for kicking big and costly issues down the road was always going to end badly, but it’s now becoming a liveability problem for those in the South East.
The commute between Brisbane and the Gold Coast has gone from an average of just over an hour to at least 90 minutes during the peak morning and afternoon periods.
Woe betide the poor motorist who then has to contend with an accident. Serious crashes can delay motorists by hours, as we saw yesterday.
It is not uncommon for fatal crashes on the Pacific Motorway to delay the trip by three or four hours, as police and forensic crash officers investigate.
Congestion both ways is now the norm rather than the exception, and there are mounting hotspots where traffic grinds to a halt regardless of road conditions around Mt Gravatt, South Bank, Springwood, Pimpama, Coomera and Southport.
Even when built, the Coomera Connector is merely a band-aid solution to the much wider problem of a motorway that has simply outgrown its usefulness.
When the Pacific Motorway was opened in 1995, engineers said it would be at full capacity by 2015. Ain’t that the truth.
This government’s inability to plan vital road and rail networks is a damning indictment on its lack of vision.
With the 2032 Olympic Games less than a decade away, we need plans for a duplication of the Gold Coast section of the M1 to be rolled out now.
The impact of such poor planning on business and the environment is incalculable. Motorists need to get used to Los Angeles-style traffic snarls. It’s the price we pay for electing politicians with little ability.