How Coomera Connector will make traffic in some areas worse

It’s meant to free up roads from traffic, but there are already indications that in some areas the Coomera Connector will make things far worse, writes Keith Woods.

Cheerio Calmwater Crescent. Goodbye Serenity Boulevard. And hello highway from hell?

These quiet, residential streets may soon need a name change.

Councillor William Owen-Jones has for some time been relaying to residents in Division 2 information he receives about the Coomera Connector and its likely impacts.

Although it’s a state government not a council responsibility, in doing so, he has arguably done a better job of communicating useful facts about the project than the Department of Transport and Main Roads (TMR).

His most recent social media post about the matter was the most eye-opening yet.

Cr Owen-Jones revealed that seven junctions along council-controlled Helensvale Road were earmarked for conversion from roundabouts to traffic light-controlled intersections, including junctions at the aforementioned Calmwater Crescent and Serenity Boulevard.

The reason? According to Cr Owen-Jones, it is “largely to cope with the impacts of the Coomera Connector”.

Local residents are alarmed – and understandably so – at the prospect that Helensvale Rd is transformed overnight from a thoroughfare with relatively light traffic, to one that is heavily congested.

It is worth noting that Stage 1 of the Coomera Connector project is broken into three smaller sections – north, central and south. The north section, which is advancing fastest, actually terminates at Helensvale Rd. According to TMR’s timeline, from late 2024, Stage 1 will “progressively open to traffic in sections”.

Given there are only three sections involved, this would seem to imply a strong possibility that for some period of time Helensvale Rd will be the place where the road ends and every vehicle that uses it must transfer to the local road network.

We can only hope that such an eventuality does not take place.

The purpose of the Coomera Connector is to help relieve the infernal clogging of routes feeding the M1 such as Foxwell and Yawalpah Roads, not recreate the problem elsewhere.

Not addressed to date is the potential impact at Exit 60 of the M1, where Helensvale Rd meets the motorway. This is also the exit for Movie World and Wet’n’Wild.

Families heading to those theme parks from Coomera may consider that they have an efficient new route. That won’t be the case if they hit long lines at Exit 60, which itself is “controlled” by traffic lights that take an eternity to meander through their cycle.

This column, with some regret, recognises the real need for the Coomera Connector. It also recognises, with even greater regret, that there is some logic to having an exit at Helensvale Rd.

But significant upgrades will clearly be needed at Helensvale Rd to cope with the expected upsurge in traffic.

Since the Coomera Connector will cause that need, the state needs to take responsibility for those upgrades and associated costs as part of the overall project, not just dump the traffic on local roads and let council pick up the pieces.

Even more importantly, for once the cart should not be put before the horse. The Helensvale Rd exit should not be opened to traffic until those necessary upgrades are completed.

If not, serenity and calm may no longer be the defining features of streets in the surrounding area.