Tugun Bypass: Everything you need to know about controversial road
It took half a billion dollars and more than a decade of argument before southern Gold Coast finally saw relief on their roads. FIND OUT WHY
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THE road to reality was long and twisted for the Tugun Bypass.
Its opening in mid-2008 was a family day of celebration as people walked the length of the road and through its tunnel.
It was a moment of joy for the public after years of careful planning and for the public which had to endure multiple false starts in the 11 years it took to take the project from the drawing board to completion.
The Tugun Bypass was first pitched in the 1996-97 financial year and had bipartisan support at a state level from Labor and the Coalition.
However, it failed to progress because the Howard government refused to co-fund it.
Progress was made but the project hit a shock brick wall in late 2003, just weeks out from construction beginning, when NSW Roads Minister Carl Scully pulled the pin, citing endangered frogs, potoroos and orchids, as well as uncertainty over the project as his reasons.
The Bypass again became an issue at the February 2004 election where Premier Beattie pledged another $120m for the road and a new route – but at the cost of relocating 14 homes.
Under the plans, the new route was to begin from the Stewart Rd interchange, run behind the John Flynn Hospital, cut across Boyd St through a recycling centre, through the Tugun football field and the northern end of the airport and then run parallel to Adina Ave and the Pacific Highway before meeting the existing highway at the border.
This proposal came to nothing after the federal government threatened to pull its funding.
By March 2004, Mr Beattie declared it was “time to end the nonsense” after a new report revealed the land west of the Airport was of “dubious” environmental value.
Within two months, the NSW government returned to the negotiating table while the Howard government used its 2004 budget to reaffirm its support.
Federal Transport Minister John Anderson left nobody in doubt of his position on the issue.
“It is now time for the Queensland government to settle its route with NSW,’’ he said.
“The Australian government is committed to funding our share of the Tugun bypass, because the Gold Coast Highway is now congested and slow.
“The budget shows we are standing ready to contribute $120 million to the bypass but it will only go ahead when Queensland and NSW agree on a route for a full bypass.
“Our funding for the Tugun bypass is on the table, as promised. All that Peter Beattie and Bob Carr have to do is to sort out the route, and we are doing everything we can to encourage them to reach the right agreement.’’
That deal was finally cut on May 24 that year, delighting Adina Ave residents who had feared losing their homes.
NSW Roads Minister Carl Scully backflipped and agreed to support the $360m project.
“This is a considerable improvement on the previous proposal and I am now satisfied so I am giving this my full support,’’ he told the Bulletin at the time.
“There’s still a lot of work to be done, but in the eight years I have been roads Minister, a road I have supported has never been rejected.
“I am basically putting my signature on this proposal.’’
Construction began in 2005 but the cost of the bypass ultimately blew past $500m, with the bulk of the cost going to the tunnel which ran under the Gold Coast Airport runway.
The Tugun Bypass finally opened to the public on Sunday, June 1, 2008 with a full day of activities, allowing locals to walk through the area and get a glimpse of it before vehicles started driving on it.
The first people to travel through it were the Christie family, who won a competition run by the Bulletin and Main Roads.
They made the trip in a convertible 1957 Chevrolet Bel Air alongside Premier Anna Bligh.
“That was a bit surreal, she’s a pretty easygoing sort of woman,’’ said Michelle Christie.
“It was great, we felt like celebrities waving to everyone,’’ said Mrs Christie.
“It was good to be part of history.”
For the residents of Adina Ave, it was a bittersweet day.
Rod Peters was one of the residents whose house was to be demolished to make way for Mr Beattie’s 2004 plan and used its opening to reflect on the decade-long battle to get it built.
“This is a fantastic result for us, the community and now for Queensland,’’ he told the Bulletin in 2008.
“It gets top marks from me, especially for its location.’’
However, it was an occasion tinged with sadness because his next-door neighbour Margaret Sells, who had helped lead the fight to save their street, died in December 2007, several months before its completion.
“It’s a shame. She would have loved to have seen it open,’’ Mr Peters said at the time.
‘Seething’: Fury at southern GC property resumptions
COMMUNITY consultation on the Gold Coast light rail’s extension to the border begins next week.
The Bulletin last week revealed the first look at the project, which will reshape the southern Gold Coast and set it up to cope will a rapidly growing population and decongest its roads.
It comes 20 years after the Tugun Bypass became a key transport issue in the early 2000s.
The project was first pitched in the 1996-97 financial year and had bipartisan support at a state level from Labor and the Coalition.
However it failed to progress because the Howard Government refused to co-fund it.
Fast-forward to the end of the 1990s and the streets of Tugun were becoming increasing congested.
By this time the cost of the road had blown out from the $80m pitched in 1997 to $157m because of the requirement for the tunnel under Gold Coast Airport’s runway.
An agreement was struck in early 2000 between the Queensland and NSW governments to build the road west of the airport, though the latter refused to fund the project at all.
It became a major election issue at the 2001 poll, with both Labor and the Coalition vowing to make the bypass a reality and begin construction in 2002.
Despite a valiant campaign by Liberal candidate Jann Stuckey, the seat of Currumbin was retained by Labor’s Merri Rose at the election.
However, hopes of beginning construction in 2002 proved optimistic, with a report in late 2001 revealing its future was in doubt because there was not enough money to pay for it.
The bypass cost blew out again to an estimated $255m, forcing Premier Peter Beattie to write an urgent letter to Prime Minister John Howard, asking for his personal intervention to secure funding for the bypass after the proposal of a toll to pay for the road threatened an ugly public backlash.
The Howard Government responded by committing just $30m to the project.
By early 2002, the state government revealed the road couldn’t be built until after 2005 because of a lack of funding.
Funding and planning talks continued through 2002 and 2003 with little progress until the Howard Government finally relented and agreed to put up $120m, or just under half its cost.
The project hit a shock brick wall in late 2003 just weeks out from construction beginning when NSW Roads Minister Carl Scully pulled the pin, citing endangered frogs, potoroos and orchids, as well as uncertainty over the project as his reasons.
The Bypass again became an issue at the 2004 election where Mr Beattie pledged another $120m for the road and a new route - but at the cost of relocating 14 homes.
Those families discovered their houses would be demolished when they received a letter in the mail declaring their home would be acquired by the state government.
Under the plans, the new route was to begin from the Stewart Road interchange, run behind the John Flynn Hospital, cut across Boyd Street through a recycling centre, through the Tugun football field and the northern end of the airport and then run parallel to Adina Ave and the Pacific Highway before meeting the existing highway at the border.
It was expected to mean the loss of some airport buildings and businesses and the Tugun Leagues Club, which the Government has promised to relocate.
“I say to everybody who is affected by this proposal: They will be dealt with in the most sensitive way we can,” Mr Beattie told the Bulletin.
“The people who are going to be affected by this proposal have all been notified this morning. They have been doorknocked by a team of people including Merri Rose.
“This is difficult for those residents who are going to have to move, but I assure them that, if we are re-elected, my Government’s door will be open to all of them.”
Among those devastated at the prospect of losing their homes were Bilinga residents Bill and Jan Bogan, Ada Roberts, Craig Wheeler, Carly Reid and Rod Peters who spoke to the Bulletin on the day the announcement was made.
Ms Rose lost her seat to Ms Stuckey at the poll but Mr Beattie’s Labor government was re-elected. The Howard Government was left “seething” after being kept in the dark by the state over the proposal, which was made in the dying days of the election campaign.
It threatened to block the road and withdraw its funding unless a new route was found.
Also deeply unimpressed was Airport general manager Dennis Chant.
“All we have seen so far is a picture of a map,’ he said.
“We were contacted by Main Roads people about two hours before it all went public but at this stage we still do not know many of the details.”
Controversial solution to southern Coast’s traffic nightmare
IT’S no secret the southern Gold Coast is becoming an increasingly popular place to live.
From increasingly congested roads to more tourists and residents, the border region is feeling the growing pains.
The Bulletin this week revealed The once-sleepy border suburb of Coolangatta, which takes in Kirra and Rainbow Bay, has become one of the biggest development hubs across the city, with 13 luxury projects under construction or selling, with many more on the way for the sites surrounding some of the world’s most famous surf breaks.
Big name developers, including Sahba Abedian and Melbourne-based rich lister Max Beck have projects waiting in the wings while prolific Gold Coast builders Paul Gedoun and Spyre Group already have towers coming online.
It’s become so busy that Coolangatta has been dubbed “the new Main Beach” by real estate figures.
With so many towers coming, debate has turned to how the light rail will transform these streets when it eventually is extended to the border via the Gold Coast Airport
It comes 25 years after the last time a southern Gold Coast decongestion project sparked enormous debate.
Newer Gold Coast residents will be surprised to find that the announcement of the Tugun Bypass was greeted with horror by many locals and led to a long-running and politically charged battle to prevent its construction.
Jump back 25 years ago and the Gold Coast was a dramatically difference place which was already facing heavily congested roads.
It was also a very different political era, with John Howard newly installed as Prime Minsiter and Rob Borbidge’s Coalition Government in power up in Brisbane.
Then-transport Minister Vaughan Johnson lobbied the Howard Government for more than $250m to upgrade the Pacific Highway.
Yet to be renamed the M1, the state government of the day wanted to widen the entire Gold Coast-Brisbane stretch to eight lanes by 2006.
It was expected to cost $1bn.
The Gold Coast – NSW border section was to include a four-lane Tugun Bypass built to the west of Coolangatta Airport.
“While it is clear the biggest portion of the highway is in New South Wales, southeast Queensland is one of the fastest growing areas in the county,’’ he said.
“The population here will grow 100 per cent over the next 20 years. Road infra structure has to grow with the population.
“This is a vital corridor for both local and through traffic whereas the highway from the border to Newcastle has not the same population.’’
This lobbying was ignored by the federal government in both its 1996 and 1997 budgets.
By 1998, no progress had been made, sparking demands from the state opposition and Gold Coast councillors for action to make the Bypass a reality.
Deputy Opposition Leader Jim Elder said ``political grandstanding and posturing’’ by the Borbidge Government had been a “waste of time”, while Coolangatta councillor Sue Robbins, who was contesting the seat of Currumbin in that year’s state election for the Nationals attacked NSW Transport Minister Carl Scully.
She declared he was “negative, arrogant and un-Australian” after Mr Scully told an economic development meeting that NSW would not contribute to the cost of the bypass even though two thirds of it would be in that state.
Mr Elder said: ``The Pacific Highway is a road of national significance _ not a NSW road or a Queensland road _ and the Tugun bypass is therefore the responsibility of the Federal Government.
“`Mr Borbidge should be too ashamed to show his face on the Gold Coast … if he fails to raise this important funding issue with Mr Howard in Canberra.’’ Months out from the 1998 state election, Mr Vaughan proposed to Cabinet two potential routes for the bypass.
One proposal involved a road-rail tunnel through the airport grounds.
The other route, running further west, involved a road through the airport grounds.
It was to cross a corner of the Cobaki Broadwater.
The seven kilometre bypass, he said, was needed to cut out a traffic bottleneck between Tugun Heights and Tweed Heads. Proposals to the east of the airport were ruled out. Opposition immediately erupted, with the Tweed Shire Council, voting to oppose a western bypass rout, while environmentalists also announced they would fight the project, citing its impact on the Cobaki Broadwater.
The same Cabinet meeting also saw the Borbidge Government endorse a plan to extend the Gold Coast railway line to the NSW border with five stations along the way.
Neither were approved by the Borbidge Government’s downfall.
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