B-Double truck plying the Great Western Highway
New South Wales, Australia
(Photo by Editor 20121005, free in public domain, click image to enlarge)
.
It’s all about trucks, bigger trucks, more trucks.
.
An Innocuous Announcement
.
The government of the State of New South Wales (NSW) in Australia late last month announced its plans to rename New South Wales’ major roads, highways, freeways and tollways under an alpha-numeric rebranding, akin to the British road numbering system.
Its ‘Alpha Numeric Route Marker Project‘ will affect more than 60 routes across NSW identified for the upgrade at a forecast cost of around $20 million. The delegated agency, the NSW Roads and Maritime Services (the rebranded ‘Roads and Traffic Authority’), is to roll out this new system of highway route numbering between March and December 2013.
[Source: ‘Have Your Say’, Bang the Table Pty Ltd (ACN 127 001 236) – a public relations consultancy outsourced by the NSW Government to deal with communities (voters) ^http://haveyoursay.nsw.gov.au/road-route-markers]
.
The new system will include a combination of letters and numbers between 1 and 99.
Well, in the case of the Great Western Highway through the Blue Mountains (formerly called the Western Road) it will lose its historically familiar name and be rebranded the rather clinical and characterless ‘A32‘.
Instead of people travelling along the famous Great Western Highway over the Blue Mountains, they will simply follow the rather nondescript ‘A32‘, which will sound no different to the ‘A31‘ or the ‘A33‘, wherever they are?
Clinical and characterless trunk routing in the UK
.
Removing the ‘Great Western Highway‘ name will erase its historical meaning to travellers – the oldest highway into inland Australia. The highway journey itself will supplanted by getting from A to B, as fast as possible. The Blue Mountains used to be a destination, but is steadily being transformed into a route from Sydney on the A32 to other destinations further west. So much for the tourism upon which so many Blue Mountains folk so vitally depend.
Grose Valley, Blue Mountains
(Photo by Editor 20060625, free in public domain)
.
..What Blue Mountains? Where? Oh! Was that them?
.
As the highway is widened and transformed into a trucking expressway, the Blue Mountains from the highway is looking urban just like Sydney. The Blue Mountains as a destination is steadly fading into another fast transit route into and out of Sydney, like the F3.
It is quite contradictory for the NSW Roads Minister, Duncan Gay, to promise that the road routes will retain their regular name, along with their new alpha-numeric designation. Why spend $20 million to rebrand the regular road naming with alpha-numeric road naming, only to retain the regular naming? The current road naming already displays the route number, as evidenced by the Route ‘32‘ symbol on the current Great Western Highway sign below. So why change it?
Great Western Highway across the Blue Mountains
(National Trucking Route 32)
(Photo by Editor 20121005, free in public domain)
.
But the alpha numeric road renaming is clearly more than just renaming. It is ‘road rebranding‘ as a first phase of the government’s ‘road reclassification‘ strategy. It is one thing to upgrade a regional highway like the Great Western Highway; it is quite blue sky to reclassify it into a ‘Route of National Significance‘.
The alpha numeric road renaming is a precursor to reclassifying the Great Western Highway as an ‘A’ grade route of national significance, which is what the Hume Freeway is. Reclassification sets the precedent for the highway over the Mountains to bve upgraded to the likes of the Hume, if goivernmenyt so wishes. Both will be deemed A’ grade routes of national significance. It is a one size fits all approach from the urbane big brother in Macquarie Street.
This announced road renaming will follow a policy trend interstate in Queensland, Victoria and South Australia and so will be consistent with these adjoining states. NSW will mirror the road numbering system in Britain which has established ‘trunk roads‘ as designated long distance trucking routes interconnecting cities, ports and airports.
This road rebranding is about facilitating national trucking linehaul across state borders. It is all about encouraging more road freight across the country. For line-haul trucking, the aim is getting from A to B, as fast as possible. The slower the road journey, the higher the freight cost.
British Motorways: conceived, designed and built principly for road freight
[Source: ‘FTA man joins DfT for lorry charge development’, 20121004, by Chris Tindall, ^http://www.commercialmotor.com/latest-news/fta-s-ch, accessed 20121005]
.
But the NSW Government’s official selling point is that its alpha numeric road rebranding is all so that motorists have “a better way to navigate NSW roads”. “It will be a more intuitive way for road users to navigate around NSW. These changes will help simplify journeys, making them safe, efficient and enjoyable.”
According to the RTA-RMS, the upgrade of the Great Western Highway is to ‘improve road safety’, ‘improve road freight efficiency’, ‘cater for the mix of through, local and tourist traffic and ‘be sensitive to the area’s natural environment, heritage and local communities.’ [Source: ^http://www.rta.nsw.gov.au/roadprojects/projects/great_western_hway/index.html]
However, one suspects given the RTA-RMS’s arrogant track record of its expressway bulldozing through roadside vegetation and local communities, that the primary mission is one-eyed to ‘improve road freight efficiency’. The other aims are merely for RTA-RMS public relations tricky appeasement, freeing up the expressway engineers to proceed business-as-usual.
Great Western Highway bulldozed out to four lanes at Katoomba
(Photo by The Habitat Advocate 20090501, free in public domain)
.
The NSW Government persuasive language is that the alpha numeric rebranding is to ‘standardise the system’, to end the confusion between states, to identify road corridors ‘in order of their importance‘ and so ‘make it easier for motorists to know if they are travelling on a motorway or a route of national or state significance as they plan their trip.’ In any case the Government’s additional quip is that well road signs in NSW have not been reviewed for 30 years, so that is a valid reason to do so.
Trunk Route 32 starts from industrial areas and is designed purely to route trucking
The Route numbering designation has nothing to do with ordinary motorists; such association is political spin.
.
But why do ordinary motorists need to know whether a road has national or state significance? The route numbers are already there on the current road signs across the State.
The NSW Opposition has dismissed this project as a ‘colossal waste of money that won’t save motorists a single minute in travel time or improve road conditions and safety.’ At the same time the NSW Opposition claims ‘motorists of this State want new roads, less congestion and better road conditions..‘ [Source: ‘New road names a colossal waste of money’, 20120927, by John Robertson, Robert Furolo, ^http://www.nswalp.com/media/news/new-road-names-a-colossal-waste-of-money/]
.
Alpha-Numeric Renaming – a precursor to more Trucking Expressways
.
Could there indeed be another reason for embarking on a $20 million road rebranding project? Is the rebranding in fact a precursor to legislating for B-double trucks to ply regional roads where they are currently prohibited?
It is one thing to upgrade a regional highway like the Great Western Highway; it is quite ‘blue sky’ to reclassifying a regional highway like the Great Western Highway into a ‘Route of National Significance‘.
.
Ed:
This road re-branding is a ‘one-size-fits-all’ edict for uniformity. It serves to abet trucking lobbyists, to befit centralist bureaucrats, while de-personalising local communities in the process. It is a strategic precursor to rolling out more Trucking Expressways. It reeks of rancid Babyboomerism – the self-entitlement, the moral relativism, the utilitarianism, oil-dependent industries…all cultural throwbacks to the exploitative 20th Century. Die off, history beckons!
.
Such reclassification facilitates central government roughshodding of legitimate local community concerns about the adverse and permanent impacts. When the RTA-RMS wants to bulldoze its trucking expressways through local communities, the legal reclassification overrides concerns about the impacts on environment, amenity, land values, equity and access. It is a prejudiced arrogant policy undermining local democratic rights.
The scheme is inherited from the recent NSW Government centralist planning policy that designated projects of State Significance and Projects of National Signifiance. In 2005, the NSW Government conceived its autocratic State Environmental Planning Policy (Major Projects) then in March 2006 imposed its ‘NSW Major Projects Assessment System‘ upon the people of NSW. It was all to ‘remove unnecessary red tape’, ‘clarify the assessment of major projects’, and ‘help NSW remain Australia’s economic powerhouse.’ [Ed: Sometimes spin can be so poetic]
It became known as Part 3A – a new part of the Environmental Planning and Assessment Act 1979 (EP&A Act) that simply overruled all other parts. Easy!
Under this planning policy and amended planning legislation, if the NSW Government deemed an infrastructure project to be of ‘State Significance’, then local council objections would be automatically overruled and community protests discarded. The State’s Planning Minister would have ultimate say supposedly in the State’s interest to allow the project to proceed and to roughshod all social impacts and all environmental impacts. It was a return to autocracy, just like in the days of kings and queens ruling over serfs and peasants.
But now for a road to be deemed a ‘Route of National Significance’ (i.e. get the ‘A’ branding), well, local communities will have even less of a voice.
The policy is absolute Putinesk (neo-‘Stalinist’).
Goodbye Bullaburra – set to be the next victim of the Trucking Expressway
(Photo by Editor 20120103, free in public domain, this is a photo for the historical record)
.
This alpha numeric road renaming is ‘road rebranding‘ and the first phase of the government’s ‘road reclassification‘ strategy. It is part of a broader road centric freight agenda that ignores the demonstrable long-term and future-resilient benefits of rail freight nationally.
Reclassifying the Great Western Highway into the A32 Road of National Significance achieves more than upgrading the regional highway to a four-lane trucking expressway, all so that thousands of B-doubles can nudge 90kph on cruise control. The Road of National Significance is national trucking route policy. It will see the 1950’s conceived National Route 32 from Sydney 1154km to Cockburn on the South Australian Border and extend well beyond to Adelaide, Perth and Darwin.
It is 1950s mindset applied in 2013. It is all about facilitating interstate freight by 25 metre long B-Double trucks.
Trunk Route 32, somewhat further west The distance sign heading east from the NSW/SA Border at Cockburn
This is now the western terminus of National Route 32 following the implementation of alpha-numeric route marking in South Australia, Jan 2005.
[Source: ^http://www.ozroads.com.au/NSW/RouteNumbering/National%20Routes/32/nr32.htm]
.
Meanwhile, hectare after hectare of Blue Mountains native vegetation is bulldozed to make way for the ‘Trucking Expressway‘.
Wentworth Falls bushland amenity disappearing for the Trucking Expressway
(Photo by Editor 20120201, free in pubic domain, click image to enlarge)
.
Meanwhile, Australian wildlife slaughtered as roadkill is perpetuated and ignored by the RTA-RMS to make way for the ‘Trucking Expressway‘.
.
Meanwhile, just because the road is wider and faster, humans are not exempt from becoming ‘roadkill’ either.
All we need do is look at Britain, its road-freight centric policy and its consequential trucking carnage legacy.
Trucking Expressways kill local communities in more ways than one
.
Meanwhile, the ongoing trucking carnage legacy continues along already upgraded sections of the Great Western Highway:
[Source: “Frightening” figures released’, by journalist Krystyna Pollard, 20110914, Blue Mountains Gazette (newspaper), p.7]
.
[Source: ‘Gone too soon’, by journalist Damien Madigan, 20110914, Blue Mountains Gazette (newspaper), p.1]
.
[Source: ‘Highway mayhem’, by journalist Shane Desiatnik, 20110803, Blue Mountains Gazette (newspaper), p.1]
.
Linehaul Trucking and pedestrians don’t mixTrucking Economics does not overrule!
[Source: Blue Mountains Gazette (newspaper]
.
.
.
Speeding B-Double overturned at Lapstone on an already widened 4-laned section of the converted Trucking Expressway
[Source Blue Mountains Gazette, 20110729]
.
What is preventing B-Triples bidding for access to Roads of National Significance?
‘A man has been fined after being stopped by police for allegedly speeding in the state’s Southern Highlands.
About 5.44am yesterday (Monday 5 March 2012), police were patrolling the (6-laned) Hume Highway at Mittagong, when they allegedly detected a white B-double (truck) travelling at a speed of 142kph in an 110kmh zone. They stopped the vehicle a short distance away and issued the 41-year-old male driver with a traffic infringement for exceed speed over 30km/h.
The fine for the offence is $1112.
[Ed: A poultry slap on the wrist fine? When 60+ tonnes is hurtling along the road at 142kph, how is this not attempted murder?]
Killer on the Road
.
Mar 2012: ‘Fatal head-on in NSW’ (south of Oberon)
[Source: ‘Fatal head-on in NSW’, bigpondnews, Saturday, March 31, 2012, ^http://bigpondnews.com/articles/National/2012/03/31/Fatal_head-on_in_NSW_734843.html]
‘A truck driver has been killed, and three men have been airlifted to hospital, after two trucks collided head-on near Oberon, west of Sydney.
Police say the Isuzu table top truck and Mack prime mover logging truck crashed on Abercrombie Road, at Black Springs just before midnight (AEDT).
The Isuzu driver, aged in his 30s, died at the scene. Two other men inside suffered head and chest injuries, while the driver of the other truck, aged in his 60s, has an injury to his leg. Abercrombie Road is expected to remain closed until around 7am (AEDT).’
Typical prime mover logging truck (empty)
.
Jul 2009: Recall the fatal truck crash east of Oberon three years ago…
‘One man died and another was airlifted to a Sydney hospital after a car and truck crashed head-on near Oberon yesterday afternoon.
Emergency services received reports about 1.12pm of a car hitting a truck on the Duckmaloi Road near Fearndale Road on the Sydney side of Oberon. Ambulance officers arrived and began treating the men involved in the accident. The passenger of the car was declared dead at the scene.
The 20-year-old male driver of the car was airlifted to Westmead Hospital with multiple fractures to his legs, arms and chest as well as head injuries. The truck driver was assessed by ambulance officers and did not require hospitalisation. Late last night the Duckmaloi Road was still close to non-residential traffic as spilt fuel and debris was cleaned from the site.
An Oberon trucker driver, who wished to remain anonymous, later said the Duckmaloi Road needed to be seriously looked at due to the large amount of traffic it carried.
“Along with the Bathurst road it is one of the two main veins into Oberon,” he said. “I believe around 200 trucks a day would use that road to get from Oberon to Sydney and back again.”
The truck driver added that for people who did not frequently use the Duckmaloi Road it could be very dangerous. “It can be bloody treacherous if you don’t know it,” he said.
“In one day I think we send about 50 trucks out and have 50 trucks come back in on it [the Duckmaloi Road]. “If you also add in the log trucks and the chip trucks than you would easily have 200 trucks a day on that road.”
[Ed: Two years later, $395,000 from the Australia Government went into widening the Duckmaloi Road. ^Read More]
.
Fatal truck head-on near Oberon, NSW (2009)
.
2012: Great Western Highway – Wentworth Falls East ‘trucking upgrade’
No 1 Feature: “Widening the highway to four lanes with sealed shoulders“!
No 1 Benefit: “Quicker journeys – in the region and to Sydney“!
‘Delays are expected today on a section of the Hume Highway in NSW after a crash involving two trucks near Marulan. NSW Police says a B-double carrying furniture rolled about 5km south of Marulan at 12.45am, spilling its load and blocking all northbound lanes. A semi-trailer travelling behind crashed into the rear of the truck…’
.
Jul 2011: Near the same spot a year before..’Fatal crash near Marulan’
‘A report will be prepared for the coroner following a fatal highway crash near Marulan in the early hours of the morning.
About 12.45am this morning a B-double truck travelling north on the Hume Highway left the road and plunged into a deep roadside gully, rolling on to its side and taking out trees and a 10-meter section of guard rail in the process. The cause of the crash is still unknown and police investigations are continuing. No one else was injured in the crash.
The driver, a 47-year-old man from Glenfield, suffered severe injuries and died at the scene. He was travelling from Albury to Sydney when the accident occurred approximately 15km north of Goulburn.
[Ed: All night 60+ tonne all night bats out of hell and 60+ tonne all night zombies being driven to death by greedy retailers demanding pre-dawn delivery times. Overnight linehaul is al about unnatural sleep depravation. It is death waiting to happen. Driving on Australian highways aafter midnight has become Russian Roulette death wish to all road users. Meanwhile, Australian Truckers Association chairman David Simon says the government should also be encouraging more “AB-triples” — which are 51m long — and “BAB-quads”, which are two connected B-doubles.” [Read More]
Why have railway tracks, when trucking companies keep adding carriages and ring feeders?
.
Mar 2012: B-Double truckers tampering with speed governors
[Source: ‘Police blitz on trucks widens’, by AAP, 20120307, ^http://www.weeklytimesnow.com.au/article/2012/03/07/453455_machine.html]
“Faster, faster..you’re a good operator!”
.
‘New South Wales police have seized two South Australian trucks as part of a crackdown on unsafe practices in the road transport industry. Officers in NSW had intercepted 13 trucks from Scott’s Transport Industries as of today in a nationwide blitz on the Mt Gambier-based firm, which operates a fleet of 322 trucks and is suspected of serious safety breaches.
NSW police launched Operation Overland after one of the company’s B-doubles was detected travelling at 142kph on Monday.
An analysis of the company’s trucks’ movements has shown speeding by 32 of them.
Superintendent Stuart Smith said the two trucks were stopped after being identified as having defects, but it was too early to say if the defects were the result of tampering.
He said more of the company’s vehicles would be targeted for interception and comprehensive mechanical inspections.
“It’s not the 300, but it’s a large number,” Superintendent Smith said. “There’s a large number to go and the operation will continue for a number of days.”
Further actions by NSW Roads and Maritime Services will likely lead to a prosecution and significant fines.
Premier Barry O’Farrell said transport companies had been warned checks would become more regular. “Trucking companies should understand that what was then unprecedented action would become more regular if we had suspicions that there were cowboys driving trucks across the state’s roads, that it was likely to cause safety concerns for motorists,” Mr O’Farrell told reporters in Sydney.
Police have said an investigation of Lennons Transport Services, based in Sydney’s inner west, found eight trucks had been tampered with, including seven that had been modified to exceed the maximum speed of 100km/h. They have also charged a Lennons’ driver with dangerous driving causing the deaths of three members of one family on January 24.
Calvyn Logan, 59, and his elderly parents Donald and Patricia Logan, in their 80s, were killed when a Lennons‘ B-double truck careered onto the wrong side of the Hume Highway, near Menangle in southwest Sydney.
B-double truck driver Vincent Samuel George (33) killed three members of one family with his B-Double.
Court records also revealed that between 1998 and last year, George had his licence suspended five times and he has been convicted of 17 offences, including speeding and drink driving.
[^http://www.truckinlife.com.au/articles/2012/truck-collision-menangle-bridge]
.
Police allege the driver’s truck had been tampered with to make it go faster.
.
The RMS has also filed a series of summons in the NSW Supreme Court relating to driver fatigue at South Penrith Sand and Soil.
RMS alleges a series of offences relating to drivers’ work hours, rest hours and fatigue management. A cyclist was killed and three were injured after a truck driver working for the company veered into a breakdown lane and hit them on the M4 motorway on April 10, 2010.
The driver pleaded guilty last week to manslaughter.
Sydney’s M4: this is supposedly an RMS cycle lane
.
Recall, RMS ‘upgrade features‘ at its Great Western Highway Wentworth Falls East section include:
“Improved cyclist access and safety – access for commuter and long distance cyclists will be provided by a 2.5 metre shoulder between Nelson and Dalrymple avenues.”
Try riding a bicycle through the Leura section, just up the Great Western Highway from Wentworth Falls
Spot the cycle lane…Russian Roulette anyone?
.
Great Western Highway – being transformed into a trucking expressway so that bigger and more trucks can travel faster, all night long..Trucking Expressways are the antithesis of road safety
.
.
Mar 2012: ‘Twelve more trucks had speeds tampered’
Another 12 trucks have been discovered with tampered speed limiters during a two-state police probe into dodgy practices (Ed: read ‘criminally culpable‘) in the industry.
Police inspecting Lennons Transport Services B-Double truck
.
‘Operation Overland’
Operation Overland was launched into Scott’s Transport Industries on Monday. Ninety-eight of the South Australian transport company’s fleet of 322 heavy vehicles have since been intercepted for mechanical inspection.
On Thursday, police said they had found six trucks with tampered speed limiters. A day later, 12 more had been discovered, taking the total to 18.
Overall, 71 offences have been identified, including two trucks found to be overloaded.
Almost 70 defect notices have been issued. The probe into Scott’s Transport Industries began after one of its drivers was clocked travelling at 142km/h on the Hume Highway at Mittagong about 5.45am (AEDT) on Monday.
.
Earlier this year, police swooped on Lennons Transport Services, in Sydney’s inner-west, where they discovered eight tampered trucks, including seven modified to exceed the 100km/h maximum.
Police Blitz at Lennons Transport Services
.
It came after a Lennons driver was charged with dangerous driving causing the deaths of Calvyn Logan, 59, and his elderly parents Donald and Patricia Logan, in their 80s.
The truckie’s B-double allegedly careered onto the wrong side of the Hume Highway near Menangle and crashed into the trio’s car.
.
Feb 2011: ‘Man dies after trucks collide on Hume Freeway, Baddaginnie’
Six-laned Hume Freeway – the wider and faster the expressway…All night trucking zombies
[Photo: Jon Hargest, Herald Sun]
.
‘A man has died following a collision between two trucks on the Hume Freeway in Baddaginnie (Ed: Victoria, just south of the NSW border) just after midnight.
It’s believed one driver lost control of his truck which rolled onto the freeway moments before a second truck collided with it at 12.08am.
The driver of the second truck died and police are investigating the cause of the collision. The identity of the dead man is yet to be established.
The Hume Freeway is closed northbound at Violet Town and diversions are in place.’
.
Comments:
Patrick of Rooney (20110215):
“Wake up and sip the coffee Victoria! We need thousands more speed cameras out there!”
.
Andrew of Flemington (20110215):
“Worksafe Victoria, where are you?? Another tragic death caused by unsafe work practices. How many more deaths and injuries must occur before you finally step in?
.
Feb 2011: ‘Logging truck driver kills car driver stopped at traffic lights outside Bathurst’
[Source: ‘One killed in truck crash‘, by Jo Johnson, Western Advocate, 20110201, ^http://www.westernadvocate.com.au/news/local/news/general/one-killed-in-truck-crash/2062626.aspx]
Media news often doesn’t travel outside one’s local area, so other Australians don’t realise the extent of the trucking carnage being inflicted across the country..Who says truck drivers are ‘professionals’?
.
‘A 59-year-old local man is dead and two others seriously injured after a truck ploughed into three cars stopped at roadworks traffic lights on the O’Connell Road yesterday. The tragedy occurred at lunchtime, about 15 kilometres south of Bathurst.
Emergency services rushed to the scene to find people trapped in their cars. The road was immediately closed to traffic in both directions. Initial investigations have revealed that an unladen logging truck struck the vehicles, which were all making their way towards Bathurst at the time.
Police, ambulance and fire and rescue crews were called to the crash site at about 12.30pm. An air ambulance helicopter landed on the road near the accident to provide additional assistance.
Bathurst police Inspector Ross Wilkinson confirmed the driver of a red Toyota Camry died at the scene. He was a 59-year-old male from the O’Connell region.
The logging truck was travelling north when it slammed into the rear of the Toyota Camry, killing the man and seriously injuring a female passenger.
The driver of the next car in line, a silver Mazda Astina, was also in a serious condition yesterday afternoon, while the driver of a bronze Holden Rodeo was taken to Bathurst Base Hospital for observation.
Inspector Wilkinson said Chifley Local Area Command’s crash investigation unit attended the scene and investigations into the fatality would continue. The driver of the logging truck was uninjured and is helping police with their inquiries.
Traffic was diverted via Brewongle and The Lagoon and drivers heading to Oberon from Bathurst late yesterday afternoon were advised to divert at Hartley via Jenolan Caves Road.
The roadworks were being carried out by the NSW Roads and Traffic Authority (Ed: recently rebranded ‘RMS’) , between the Wests Lane turn-off to Brewongle and Ridge Road.
.
Feb 2010: ‘Speeding B-Double Blayney Cattle Truck Rolls Over – kills/maims 21 cattle’
Injured cattle shot after speeding cattle truck overturned on bend near Blayney (Central NSW)
.
Traffic between Blayney and Bathurst was detoured through Millthorpe yesterday after a semi-trailer cattle truck overturned while negotiating a sharp left bend about three kilometres out of Blayney.
Drivers on the Mid Western Highway had to slow to avoid runaway cattle after the accident on the outskirts of Blayney shortly after 11am.
Inspector Ross Wilkinson from Chifley Area Command said that police were continuing their investigations into the cause of the accident that disrupted highway traffic for four hours and killed 21 of the 96 cattle on board the truck.
“Police will issue an infringement notice to the truck driver at a later stage,” he said. “It’s a timely reminder for drivers to take care when driving in the changing weather conditions.” [Ed: Yet another dangerous coyboy truckie gets but a slap on the wrist. The driver deserves a custodial sentence for recklessly causing pain and suffering to the cattle, and barred from cattle truck driving for life].
.
The road between Bathurst and Blayney was closed for 30 minutes while cranes were brought in to lift the truck back onto the road. RTA workers, who were among the first at the accident scene, began directing traffic and slowing motorists down to avoid the cattle before police arrived.
“We’ve been trying to keep things flowing,” one RTA worker said. “A couple of steers got away but they’ve pretty well got them under control.”
Blayney Shire Council overseer, Paul Wade, said that Blayney Shire Council staff were working with the RTA to divert Bathurst bound traffic through Millthorpe. Mr Wade said that council staff worked with the emergency services and the truck’s driver to help control the traffic and move the surviving cattle into a nearby paddock. The council’s ranger euthanized a number of cattle at the scene…
Yesterday’s accident is the second time a semi-trailer has overturned on the same winding stretch of road on the outskirts of Blayney in recent months. On January 28 traffic on the highway was disrupted for four hours when a semi-trailer travelling towards Blayney overturned while negotiating a left bend near yesterday’s accident scene.
Play Video (Prime News):
Click image to play video
(when running, double click on video to enlarge)
NB. The Rural Fire Service at Canobolas have since deleted the above video, so here is one from Channel 9:
All night truck driving solo – another dead truck driver
The driver of this B-Double was killed when it hit an embankment on the Pacific Highway near Corindi (Ed: north of Coffs Harbour) on Friday night
[Photo by Frank Reward]
.
A man was killed in an horrific crash near Dirty Creek, west of Corindi, on Friday night in what is amounting to a horror weekend on NSW roads.
A B-Double being driven by the 48-year-old man, from Queensland, had been travelling south on the Pacific Highway when it appears to have left the road and crashed into an embankment.
According to a police statement, police and emergency services were called to the crash just after 11pm where the driver, the sole occupant of the truck, had suffered serious injuries and died at the scene. According to the statement, the impact of the crash had detached the two trailers from the prime mover, but no further details were available last night…
This crash adds another death to the mounting NSW road toll with the number rising to eight since the start of the long weekend, five more than for the same long weekend last year.
.
Mar 2007: Hume Highway again.. ‘head-on truck crash kills driver’
A fatal truck crash has closed the Hume Highway near Coolac, in southern NSW. Two trucks collided head-on on the highway, sparking fires in both cabs, about 6.15am (AEDT) today, police said. The driver of a semi-trailer, carrying groceries north on the highway, died at the scene after rescue efforts failed to save him. The driver of a southbound truck, carrying metal, escaped with minor injuries…
.
Ed: The Truck Menace is blatantly out of control. ‘Industry self-regulation’ never works and is nothing but a costing cutting government cop out. Meanwhile Australian Liberal Labor governments continue to pour billions of taxpayers’s money into building bigger and faster dedicated trucking expressways. And so the trucks get bigger and faster and Australia’s highway carnage of families continues unabated…
.
Watch video:
(includes sound)
.
.
.
Postcript:
.
Well we didn’t have to wait bloody long. The day after posting this article there was another B-double multiple fatality…dead driver, dead and maimed cattle under his care…
.
Speeding truckie hooning a fully laden B-Double cattle truck, loses it on bend – kills himself and the cattle
‘A salvage operation continued into last night to remove a laden cattle truck that crashed into the Tangaratta Creek Bridge near Tamworth yesterday, claiming the life of the driver.
Oxley Highway was closed for hours as emergency crews worked at the scene, first freeing the driver’s body from the truck’s cabin, which had been crushed against the bridge pylons, and then removing dead cattle and the truck from the scene.
The B-double truck left the road and rolled at the bridge on the Oxley Highway, about 10km west of the city, about 3pm. Police believe the truck was travelling south, bound for Cargill abattoir at Tamworth, when it lost control on a sweeping bend that has been the scene of other serious accidents over the years. [Sky News: Police said the vehicle failed to negotiate a right-hand bend near Tangaratta Bridge, causing it to roll down an embankment.]
An off-duty police officer was first on the scene.
.
Police officers euthanased distressed cattle that had been crushed or injured in the trailers, which rested on their sides near the creek.
.
Oxley Local Area Command duty officer, Inspector Jeff Budd, said the recovery effort was expected to continue late into last night. He said firefighters had set up booms to contain the diesel spill in the creek.
…Yesterday’s fatal crash happened at the same bridge where a horrific bus accident occurred on January 5, 1992, claiming the lives of five people. A double-decker Pioneer bus en route from Brisbane to Melbourne slammed into the bridge on a Saturday night. The crash claimed the lives of an eight-year-old girl, as well as three women and a man.
Inspector Budd said police were continuing their investigations into the cause of yesterday’s crash and a report would be prepared for the coroner.’
.
Meanwhile pig carcasses have been scattered over a motorway in Sydney’s southwest after two trucks collided early today. Police say the heavy vehicles crashed shortly after 2am on the M7 westlink motorway at Prestons, near the Bernera Road off-ramp. The truck carrying the pig carcasses rolled, throwing the meat all over the road.
Pig carcasses picked up off M7
http://www.skynews.com.au/national/article.aspx?id=735802&vId=
Cartage Australia’s demonstration B-double sand tipper Volvo truck 22 metres long – parked in Katoomba, Blue Mountains.
(Photo by Editor, 20120210, free in public domain, click photo to enlarge)
.
Like most news across the Blue Mountains region concerning issues likely to pose a significant impact upon the community and the environment, one learns about it on the grapevine.
So two weeks ago, I learnt about this Melbourne trucking company planning to introduce 22 metre long B-Double trucks along the Great Western Highway. Such long trucks are currently banned as being too long for this regional highway through the many towns, villages and residential and school zones of the Blue Mountains.
I learn that the trucking company, Cartage Australia, is due to demonstrate one of its B-Doubles to the local community and in the process try to justify why it should be exempt from the current New South Wales Government prohibition. But the announcement is not a general public one, so naturally only a handful of the community turn up to the demonstration, because only a handful of the community were made aware.
.
Why Are Oversized and Overmass Trucks Restricted?
.
Heavy vehicles using the Great Western Highway between Victoria Pass and Lapstone Hill are currently restricted to being no more than 19 metres in length. Such vehicles are deemed to be ‘oversized’ and or ‘overmass’ to mix normally with day-to-day traffic.
According to the RTA’s (recently renamed ‘RMS’)…
“As stated in the General Class 1 Oversize (Load-Carrying Vehicle) Notice 2007 and the General Class 1 Oversize (Special-Purpose Vehicle) Notice 2007, night travel on the Great Western Highway between the Nepean River at Emu Plains and Medlow Bath for vehicles wider than 2.5 metres or longer than 19 metres is only permitted between 1.00am and 5.00am.”
In New South Wales, rules governing B-Doubles are prescribed under the RTA B-Doubles General_notice_2005 (The Road Transport (General) Act 2005 – General B-Double Notice under Division 4 of Part 2 of the Road Transport (Mass, Loading and Access) Regulation, 2005. >Read Regulation (pdf) (690kb)
.
The Sand Cartage Contract
.Hy-Tec’s Sand Quarry south of Hartley
(Google Maps)
.
Melbourne-based construction material trucker, Cartage Australia, is bidding for a sand cartage contract to Hy-Tec to deliver construction sand to the Sydney markets using 22 metre B-double trucks. This will mean many of these long B-double sand trucks dominating the Great Western Highway over the Blue Mountains. The route is to be from Hy-Tec’s sand quarry from Jenolan Caves Rd south of the village of Hartley to Sydney.
Hy-Tec is a group of companies which are wholly owned by publicly listed Adelaide Brighton Limited, a prominent Australian construction materials and lime producing company with operations throughout Australia. Two major construction projects that Hy-Tec is currently delivering to in Sydney include ‘The Ark’ – a 21 storey commercial high-rise in North Sydney and Presida’s T1 industrial 35,000 cubic metre industrial building complex at the Norwest Business Park in Bella Vista.
Director of Cartage Australia, Wayne Vella, argues that his Volvo fleet of B-doubles are “longer but safer”. Yet according to its website,
“HY-TEC’s focuses on accurate delivery times, taking direct customer enquiries at each concrete plant and quarry, supported by a large fleet of concrete trucks for quick response and best in class on time delivery.”
.
This time-critical delivery focus necessitates that the sand cartage from Hartley to Sydney will be time critical. This means the pressure will be on drivers to meat delivery deadlines and so they be in a hurry and so this poses risks of more trucks and larger heavier trucks speeding along the Great Western Highway, undermining the safety of the road for other road users.
Cartage Australia provides its services 24 hours a day, seven days a week, hauling quarry products around Melbourne – and more recently, throughout Sydney, following the opening of a new facility late last year. This means the sand cartage over the Great Western Highway has potential to be 24 hours a day.
“We opened the Sydney operation so that we can offer the same sort of service to customers there as we provide in Melbourne, and so that we can continue to grow the company. Customers can call the company at any time and we’ll strive to get the job done for them,” says Ray.
Although the Sydney arm of the business has only been fully operational for a few months, Ray is already looking at ways to further grow the business. “Wayne and I want to grow Cartage Australia as much as we can,” says Ray, as he points to further growth planned for 2012.
[Source: ‘Cartage Australia – driven by determination’, Prime Moving Magazine, February 2012, ^http://www.primemovermag.com.au/featured/article/cartage-australia-driven-by-determination]
.
The Big Sell
At the outdoors meeting on Friday 10th February 2012 staged by Cartage Australia to a handful of the local community at Katoomba, the demostration truck was all but straight out of the factory. It was bright, shiny, new tyres, flawless and made for selling the company’s point of view. The sell was all about providing Performance Based Standards (PBS) for trucking to get around the 19 metre truck length restriction. That needs to be explained by government.
Director Wayne Vella explaining all the positives about his shiny FM480 Volvo
.
But when Vella started his long spiel about the truck’s state of the art features and benefits, the focus became all about the magnificence of his showroom truck and not about the community’s concerns about copping more and longer trucks through the Blue Mountains.
Vella argued that it was not a B-double, but look at the photo of it:
.
We had to laugh when Vella professed that:
“the exhaust is so clean you could breath it.”
.
“We have applied for a special exemption and this requires us to satisfy all the high performance safety standards in place and also to show the State Government evidence of community support for these trucks. “If we get the nod, we could replace the dog-tipper trucks [used at Hartley Quarry to transport coal to Sydney via the Blue Mountains] with Volvo 500 rigid class trucks within four weeks.”
This is Cartage Australia’s current proposal to service the Hartley Quarry1 truck every 17 minutes
.
This is a Volvo FM480 too and it carts fuel and meets the Euro standards.A B-double is a B-double.
.
Here was the politically correct article on the subject published in the local newspaper a few days later. It reads almost as a scripted media release by the trucking company on prime reading page 5.
A Victorian company hopes to gain the support of highway safety lobby groups for a proposal to operate a fleet of “longer but safer” heavy vehicles through the Blue Mountains.
Heavy vehicles using the Great Western Highway between Victoria Pass and Lapstone Hill are currently restricted to being no more than 19 metres in length.
But Cartage Australia has applied to the State Government for a 12-month special exemption to replace its old dog-tipper trucks servicing Hartley Quarry with new 22-metre Volvo trucks.
The company’s director Wayne Vella gave about 15 people a demonstration of the truck’s features at Goldsmith Place in Katoomba on February 10, which include a quiet and energy efficient ‘Euro 5’ standard engine, rollover protection, quiet disc brakes, GPS satellite navigation, 24-hour driver monitoring and larger load capacity.
He said the Volvo trucks set a new benchmark in road safety, did not use noisy compression brakes and three trucks would be able to carry the same load as four dog-tipper trucks, so the number of truck trips per day would decline significantly.
“Yes, the trucks are just under three metres longer than the current limit for the Blue Mountains, but they are not B-double trucks, they only tow one trailer and are only longer to include an extra set of axles to more evenly spread the load,” he said.
“We have applied for a special exemption and this requires us to satisfy all the high performance safety standards in place and also to show the State Government evidence of community support for these trucks.
“We have introduced these trucks in Victoria and we believe if we don’t take this step here you will end up getting older and older trucks on the road that never get replaced.
“If we get the nod, we could replace the dog-tipper trucks [used at Hartley Quarry to transport coal to Sydney via the Blue Mountains] with Volvo 500 rigid class trucks within four weeks.”
Blackheath Highway Action Group chairperson Michael Paag said he would forward information about the proposal at Cartage Australia’s request to members of all highway action groups and other organisations like the Katoomba Chamber of Commerce and Community.
“Members of the general public who are interested in obtaining information or providing feedback about this proposal can contact me,” he said. (Ed. Contact details withheld for privacy).
Mr Vella said he met with Roads and Maritime Services managers in Katoomba also on February 10 to discuss the proposal and notified Member for Blue Mountains Roza Sage in November when the application for the special permit was lodged.’
.
Ed: The message is beware of selective community announcements, as they are selective and not public for reasons to suit the purpose of the protagonist – in this case Cartage Australia’s potentially lucrative contract to truck thousands of tonnes of sand over the Great Western Highway – 1 truck every 17 minutes!
.
NRMA on Truck Safety:
.
Statistics show that road freight continues to grow 1.5 times as fast as the economy, with estimates that freight is expected to double by 2020. The heavy vehicle industry constantly pushes for increases in length and load.
According to the NRMA, it is important for truck drivers to keep a safe following distance. The NRMA believes any changes should be balanced with improved safety and environmental performance. As such NRMA would like to see heavy vehicles equipped with front, side and rear under-run guards (to ensure light vehicles don’t run underneath the heavy vehicle in the event of a crash) and ABS brakes. ABS brakes allow the driver to steer while braking heavily and minimise stopping distances.
NRMA also believes heavy vehicles should be equipped with tamper-proof, on-board monitoring and speed limiting equipment. Electronic on-board monitors can better observe driving hours and driver behaviour.
NRMA also sees a need for increased enforcement of heavy vehicle speed limits. The RTA has introduced its ‘Three Strikes’ scheme, aimed at penalising heavy vehicles which are repeatedly caught exceeding the speed limit (if three strikes are recorded in a three year period the vehicle’s regisitration is suspended). However, they do have to be caught first. A trailer has a different licence plate number to the prime mover which can make it difficult to identify the vehicle when it is photographed from the rear.
NRMA would like to see all heavy vehicle camera enforcement use front and rear detection.
NRMA also supports opportunities to put more freight onto rail where distances are long and freight is suited to rail transport, but it’s naive to think that rail can transport everything.’
Speeding trucks too dangerous for the Blue Mountains
[Source: ‘Riverluck Mack’ Flickr, ^http://www.flickr.com/photos/quarterdeck/
.
But the problem is not so much the performance of one trucking company that is aspiring to deliver best practice performance safety, as Cartage Australia is publicly promising.
The problem is the precedent created that permitting one company with 22m long B-doubles will be the thin policy wedge that will allow less conscientious truckers to ply regional roads through residential and school zones. The problem is one of road safety and across the Blue Mountains, road safety especially when it comes to trucks, has a dismal and worsening road toll record. As the Great Westren Highway is transformed into a dedicated high speed trucking expressway, it becomes more dangerous.
Cartage Australia may indeed be offering the safest truck on any Australian road, but who is monitoring and enforcing best practice driver behaviour 24 hours a day? No one!
Road behaviour is simply not monitored and enforced properly by government. As more and bigger trucks speed along our highways, our highways are becoming dangerous life and death environments which is unacceptable.
.
The Habitat Advocate recommends the following standards for the Great Western Highway through the Blue Mountains:
.
No B-doubles, only semi-trailers, rigid trucks and smaller to be permitted to use the Great Western Highway between Hartley and Penrith. B-doubles to use the Bells Line of Road route.
NSW Government to suspend all new expressway development, and instead to focus on a Safety First Policy, implementing safety improvements to the current Great Western Highway width between Lawson and Lithgow, noting that the widened sections east of Lawson all but completed or work in progress
Government and freight industry to mandatorily have feasibility study into rail alternatives for any proposal for increasing road line haul – study to be independent and published online with a month of completion
Minimum of four speed cameras and four red light cameras installed on the Great Western Highway between Hartley and Nepean River, all hidden and each rotated during the year. This is to be a permanent arrangement.
Minimum of three speed cameras installed on the Bells Line of Road between Lithgow and Windsor, all hidden and each rotated during the year. This is to be a permanent arrangement.
Quality controls introduced for heavy vehicle drivers with ongoing spot checks by both Police and RTA (RMS) – including, highway monitoring of driver behaviour – tail gating, exhaust brake usage, speeds, log book compliance, vehicle condition, load safety, mobile phone usage, higher professionalism standards, etc.
Time-based pay to replace all trip based remuneration of all heavy vehicle drivers across NSW
Heavy vehicle drivers required to respect and accept variable speed zones across the Great Western Highway, especially through towns and villages and the 40kph zone limits during school morning and afternoon – double demerits for heavy vehicle drivers to reflect the seriousness of heavy vehicles breaching these laws
A mandatory concrete barrier to be installed on the entire length of the Great Western Highway between Lithgow and Penrith that an withstand collision by heavy vehicles to prevent head-on collisions
A maximum 75kph speed limit for all heavy vehicles to be imposed on the Great Western Highway between Penrith and Lithgow
The NSW Government to prepare an economic business case to show the Return on Investment and Pay Back of the Mt Victoria Bypass estimated to cost $1 billion
Prohibit heavy vehicle parking along the highway in Mount Victoria, particularly in the vicinity of the Caltex Service Station. This to be signposted accordingly, monitored by the RTA (RMS) and fines to apply for transgressions
RTA (RMS) to construct one fully accredited heavy vehicle rest area at Mount Boyce on both sides of the highway, and a second at Falconbridge on both sides of the highway to fully comply with the standards set by the National Transport Commission’s Heavy Vehicle Driver Fatigue Legislation, which came into effect on 29 September 2008.
.
Postcript:
.
Blue Mountains Gazette 20071001:
Victoria Pass Monday, 1 October 2007 Posted By Dean Driscoll, Mt Victoria.
‘Another horrific accident going down the hill at Mt Vic on Sunday. The whole zone from just east of the township to the bottom of the mountain is 60km/hour yet a large percentage of drivers going through Mt Vic seem to struggle to brake to that limit. Surely the area must be regarded as a black spot?
With persistant tail-gaters trying to speed their way through as if it was a freeway, it is time the authories give a serious look at how to manage an out of control situation’.
.
No chance!A B-Double crosses the wrong side of the Hume Highway and slams head-on into a car killing all three occupants
.
Last Friday, a brick-laden truck crossed a grass embankment, crashed through a guard rail and ended up on the opposite side of the Menangle Bridge on the Hume Highway south of Sydney. It slammed head-on into a car killing the three people inside.
It is only a matter of time before such a tragedy befalls the Great Western Highway in the Blue Mountains as more and more B-Doubles ply this regional route.
Driving along many highways throughout Australia has become deadly as more and bigger trucks travel faster just a metre away on the other side of a white line or two. Not only are there more semi-trailers, but trucking companies are increasingly putting larger capacity B-double trucks on the road, which can weigh over 70 tonnes.
When 70 tonnes hits you it is an instant wall of death.
A speeding semi ploughs into the front yard of a home in Rosanna, in eastern Melbourne on 21st September 2010
.
Yet both Liberal and Labor governments at both national and state level are pouring billions of taxpayer dollars to facilitate more road freight on Australian highways, while ignoring the comparative line haul efficiencies and inherent safety of rail freight.
In 1998, the New South Wales Labor Government announced a 12-year $360 million ‘upgrade’ of the Great Western and Mitchell Highways between Penrith (outer Sydney) and Orange in the central west of NSW. In addition, the Federal Liberal-National Coalition Government committed an extra $100 million as part of its Auslink National Network.
The ‘upgrade’ meant transforming the two lane regional highway over the Blue Mountains into a four lane 80kph expressway to facilitate greater and faster trucking – a ‘trucking expressway‘. The then promoted features of this new trucking expressway were to be:
Widening of the highway to a four lane, divided road between Penrith and Katoomba
Widening the highway to mostly three lanes between Katoomba and Mount Victoria (including Blackheath)
Providing additional overtaking lanes along stretches of the highway
Improving pedestrian and traffic facilities at intersections crossing the highway in townships
providing bicycle facilities along the highway
Extensive landscaping and urban design initiatives within Blue Mountains towns and villages.’
.
[Source: NSW Roads and Traffic Authority Great Western Highway Upgrade’ brochure, January 2002]
.
Well, the widening is certainly carving through Blue Mountains communities and bushland. Pedestrian walkways and crossings are few and far between and the few cycle lanes are within a metre of B-doubles hurtling along at 80kph – those that stick to the speed limit. Who’d be a cyclist on the Great Western Highway now unless one had a death wish?
Destruction in progress yesterday at Boddington Hill, east of Wentworth FallsGreat Western Highway Blue Mountains
(Photo by Editor 20120201, free in public domain, click photo to enlarge)
.
In September 2008, the then Federal Labor MP Bob Debus for the Macquarie electorate (covering the Blue Mountains region) committed another $450 million on the Great Western Highway to bypass the village of Mount Victoria and River Lett Hill near Lithgow.
Debus revealed the purpose of the widening on his website:
.
“The bypass will halve times between Mt Victoria and Lithgow, reduce accidents by two-thirds, and improve freight transport from the Central West .
The bypass will provide a route on the western escarpment more suited to the operation of heavy vehicles than the current Victoria Pass…”
.
[Source: ‘Bob Debus for Macquarie E-news #2‘, Bob Debus MP website, ^http://www.bobdebus.com/newsletter2.html (page since defunct since Debus has resigned from Federal Parliament]
.
The joint Labor-Liberal policy focus on developing road freight and ignoring rail freight is short-sighted 20th Century truck thinking. But it is also meaning our regional highways are morphing into bigger and faster freight routes – trucking expressways. Local communities are having to share regional roads with huge trucks.
The trucking industry has allowed itself to become largely contract based where drivers instead of being paid for their time driving are paid on a trip rate. This means that the more trips a driver makes and the faster the delivery times, the more money the drivers earn. This work arrangement only encourages truck drivers to drive faster, often too fast, with disastrous consequences.
.
‘It is a statistic that will alarm police and governments dealing with a string of fatal road accidents: almost two thirds of long haul truck drivers interviewed for a national study say their employers pressure them into using unsafe work practices.’
[Source: ‘Truckies pushed into danger zone’, by Andrew West, Sydney Morning Herald, 20100109, p.2]
.
Recent fatalities on NSW roads , including the death of an 11-year-old boy, have sparked a renewed call for action on trucks in the Mountains.
Deputy Mayor Mark Greenhill moved a matter of urgency at Blue Mountains City Council (BMCC) meeting 31st January 2012, calling on state and federal government representatives to meet with BMCC to discuss “means and methods by which large trucks can be limited or controlled in terms of behaviour on the Great Western Highway over the Blue Mountains” following several shocking incidents in other areas of the state.
Clr Greenhill: “While the courts have not yet had a chance to determine guilt or otherwise, and I don’t seek to either, recent accidents on NSW roads stand testimony to the awesome power of these trucks,” he said. “In the Campbelltown area a large truck went over the top of a car and killed three people. They had no chance. In coastal NSW a boy was killed while sleeping in his house when a large truck ploughed through it.”
Eleven-year-old boy killed when a B-double crashes through his bedroomAnyone living within 100 metres of a highway has got cause for concern
.
Penrith residents are mourning the death of Max MacGregor, the 11-year-old killed when a truck loaded with bananas crashed through his bedroom on the state’s mid-north coast. Max was asleep in the holiday home his family were renting in Urunga when, at 5am on Sunday, a B-double semi collided head-on with a ute before swerving into the holiday home (100 metres from the highway).
Clr Greenhill: “When things go wrong and [trucks] are out of control, they are an uncompromising and deadly weapon. “In that context, people have been killed in significant numbers in the Blue Mountains. It is a scandal to me that governments are not doing more to control tucks on the highway across the Mountains. “This should especially be the case while the highway works are under way.”
Clr Greenhill released BMCC figures in September last year that showed trucks were over-represented in local crash statistics and motorists were three times more likely to die in a collision with one. The statistics showed that from 2005 to 2009, trucks represented nearly a third of all vehicles involving deaths despite being less than a third of vehicles on local roads. Three per cent of all truck crashes were fatal, compared to one per cent of crashes by all other vehicles, the figures showed.
Clr Greenhill said he had reports from local residents about large trucks “even braving the Old Bathurst Road bends”, and said he would like to see vehicles such as B-doubles off local roads for the time being.’
[Source: Letter to the Editor, Blue Mountains Gazette, 20120201, p4]
.
The tragic accident involving a 25/26m B-double truck at Menangle last week reaffirms the fact that the Great Western Highway, even after the upgrade to Katoomba is completed, will never be suitable for these massive trucks.
Yet the federal government is funding stage one of a multi-billion dollar highway bypass between Mt Victoria and Lithgow, the main purpose being to allow 25/26/30m B-double trucks carrying up to 77 tonnes to use the highway through the Blue Mountains. Despite overwhelming community disapproval the federal government is pushing ahead with stage one, a purpose built 25/26/30m B-double bypass at River Lett Hill.
The Blackheath Highway Action Group along with many other Blue Mountains Groups successfully lobbied for an independent review to be conducted on the proposed Mount Victoria to Lithgow highway bypass and the future of the highway west of Katoomba. In July 2011 the NSW government appointed Evans and Peck, a firm with local knowledge to conduct this review. the review was completed in November so why is the federal government stalling on its public release?
The federal government refuses to fund a $5 million rail study, a key recommendation of the Central West Transport Needs Study. Rail deserves the same funding, tax incentives and regulatory framework as is currently given to support long haul trucking.
For the sake of safety, local amenity and the long term sustainability it’s time to give rail a fair go and permanently abandon plans to spend billions to turn our highway inot a 25/26/30m B-double freight corridor.’
~ Michael Paag, Chairman, Blackheath Highway Action Group, Blue Mountains
‘A driver has died after a truck caught fire and exploded following a head-on collision between the tabletop truck and B-double took place about 24 kilometres south of Dubbo at Mountain Creek Road about 4am, emergency services said. The Newell Highway in Dubbo is closed in both directions between Mitchell Highway and Tomingley Road. The tabletop truck was carrying food and plastic food containers, and the B-double was carrying fertiliser, Ms O’Connor said.’
.
‘Orange truck rollover’
Truck Roll Over at the intersection of Burrendong Way & The Northern Distributor Orange, Central NSW, 20100629
[Source: ‘Orange truck rollover’ by Steve Smith, Rural Fire Service, Canobolas, ^http://www.canobolas.rfs.nsw.gov.au/dsp_content.cfm?cat_id=131107]
‘One woman was killed and five people were injured in two accidents involving B-double trucks. Engineers were called to the scene of a dramatic accident on the Gateway Motorway at Boondall in Brisbane about midday yesterday, when a B-double truck exploded after it and a car collided. The intensity of the explosion and subsequent fire was so severe that parts of the truck fused together, raising concerns about damage to the road and overpass bridge underneath, a police spokeswoman said.
(Meanwhile) on the Bruce Highway near Rockhampton, a 19-year-old woman died and four people were injured when a car and a B-double truck collided. Police said the station wagon tried to turn into the southbound lanes of the Bruce Highway at Marmor just before 8pm on Friday when the car and truck, which was travelling in the northbound lane, collided.
The 19-year-old driver was killed, while her three female passengers, two aged 19 and one aged 18, were taken to Rockhampton hospital. The three are in a stable condition.The 65-year-old driver of the B-double was taken to hospital for precautionary treatment and has been released.
.
‘Three trucks involved in two separate highway collisions’
A 50-year old man was taken to Dubbo Base Hospital with serious injuries after a collision between a B-double truck and a utility vehicle, occurred about 1.15pm on the Newell Highway just south of Gilgandra.
Earlier in the day, in a separate accident, two trucks collided 25 km outside of Dubbo on the Golden Highway. A UD truck crashed into the back of a Mitsubishi Canter turning right at the Barbigal Road turn off to Wongarbon about 11.40am yesterday.
At the scene, Ballimore RFS deputy captain Col Buckler said the Golden Highway was not currently built for trucks and “most definitively” needed upgrading.
“This is the official B-double road to Newcastle (and) the roads need to be built to carry trucks,” Mr Buckler said. “It’s time they spent money to make it safer because of the amount of trucks that use it.”
.
‘Fatal crash between car and truck causes explosion, closes Pacific Highway’
AT least one person has been killed in the fiery collision between a car and a B-double truck at Warrell Creek, about 10km south of Macksville, just before 4am today.
“The B-doubles can’t pass using the diversion as the rail overpass is not suitable for their weight,” a spokesman for the Roads and Traffic Authority told AAP.
The truck involved in the crash was carrying chemicals and exploded in flames on impact, but Fire and Rescue NSW extinguished the blaze. One person from the car has been confirmed dead, but police say it’s not clear how many people were in the car when it crashed.
‘A Canberra man was lucky to escape without serious injury after the B-Double truck he was driving along the Boorowa Rd overturned at 6.15am on Wednesday morning. The 42 year old man lost control of the vehicle 2km south out of town and ran off the road, before the entire truck overturned and spilled out over both lanes of the road.
The overturned truck was carrying furniture and concrete slabs and left more than a dozen slabs scattered over the road. Local resident Russell Denning said he heard a ‘monstrous bang’ when the truck crashed on the road near his home.
Senior Constable John Newton said a lack of attention from the driver appears to be the cause of the accident but police are still investigating.
“At this stage it appears the driver was distracted but there are still final enquiries to be completed,” he said. “My understanding is the driver will receive an infringement for negligent driving.”
Noisy by day, nightmarish by night: Mt Victoria residents (Blue Mountains) near this 24-hour Caltex service station are being disturbed round-the-clock by truck drivers parking on their doorstops.
[Source: Blue Mountains Gazette, 20040924]
.
As alternating Labor and Liberal governments ignore rail investment across Australia and instead encourage and invest hundreds of million of our taxes in bigger roads for truck freight, regional highways are being transformed into noisy and dangerous trucking expressways.
Year on year, the regional Great Western Highway over the Blue Mountains for instance, has seen a steady increase in the number, size and frequency of trucks using it for long-distance linehaul. Produce, fuel, sand, soil, cement, grain, steel, concrete pipes, shipping containers are getting carted by road, some from as far away as Darwin and Perth, over the highway that runs through Blue Mountains towns and villages. There are many different speed zones to ensure the safety of local road users. All of these freight types could be carted by rail, which for the most part runs alongside the highway, but is mostly only used by passenger trains. The only commodity still banned is uranium but with federal Labor recently allowing uranium sales to India to resume, is it only matter of time before radioactive uranium is carted through Blue Mountains towns and villages?
There are commuters, school zones, buses, cyclists, pedestrian crossings and increasingly 19 metre B-double trucks hurtling along the same highway driven by ‘trip-rate’ pay incentives. Tail-gating is an all too frequently noted dangerous habit of many of these truck drivers, yet the NRMA suggests that “you try not to let the size of the vehicle intimidate you“. (Karen Fittall, NRMA’s ‘Open Road’ magazine, September/October 2005, ^http://www.mynrma.com.au/cps/rde/xchg/mynrma/hs.xsl/heavy_going.htm).
.
Trucks behaving badly Pacific Highway (and Great Western Highway)
.
.
Somehow the Transport Workers Union has allowed the hourly rate to go out the window in favour of the employer’s convenient fixed cost ‘trip rate’. So to a truck driver it’s more trips for more money based on commercial incentive arrangements. This incentive structure has become the motivation driving faster trucks and therefore more dangerous trucks to push and exceed speed limits. Across the Blue Mountains, both Great Western Highway and Bell Line of Road, highway signposted speed limits are systemically unenforced.
.
Where’s the speed governor? Where are the road patrols?
.
.
At the time of Bob Debus MP as NSW Labor Member for Blue Mountains (1981 – 1988, then again 1995 – 2007), then federal Labor member for Macquarie (2007 – 2009), the once prohibited B-double trucks surreptitiously started using the Great Western Highway. How was this allowed? Now 19 metre B-doubles are at such frequency along the highway as to be standard, but there has been no local community consultation nor local community approval. It has been an undemocratic impost. What is stopping 26 metre B-doubles creeping in?
.
Exhaust Brake Noise is Rife!
.
Many trucks drivers on the highway apply their noisy engine brakes (engine compression braking) because they are told it saves on the cost of brake pads. Engine brakes in heavy vehicles are auxiliary brakes installed as important backup safety braking to reduce the load on service brakes on a steep descent. But many truck drivers have then engaged automatically so they kick in as soon as the driver takes his foot of the accelerator pedal. (This Editor holds a Class ‘HC’ Heavy Vehicle Drivers Licence, so is aware of this lazy habit).
Many truck engine brakes are noisy and the ‘bark’ characteristic of the noise reverberates considerably at night. Truck drivers selfishly use these even as they drive through Blue Mountains towns and villages. So 24 hours a day, often in the wee small hours, these exhaust brakes can be heard reverberating for miles around, keeping many Blue Mountains residents awake.
The police do nothing – they say it’s not their job. The Roads and Traffic Authority (RTA) does nothing, except put up tokenistic signs – ‘Trucks – limit engine braking‘, which is flatly ignored and not enforced. The Blue Mountains Council does nothing – it say it’s not it’s job, even though it accepts operating as an agency for the RTA at Katoomba.
Possibly the most ignored sign on a highway
One sign means the RTA can avoid the cost of enforcement
while pretending to and meet its local government development guidelines
– on paper.
.
So truck owners apparently save on the cost of renewing their brakes, but selfishly at the expense of Blue Mountains residents trying to get a good night’s sleep. This editor lives a kilometre from the highway yet almost nightly hears some lousy trucker’s exhaust brakes as it moans up to the red lights outside Council chambers. Selfish bastards they are! I bet there’s been complaints, but typically none of these agencies has done squat about it.
.
Dodgy Truck Rest Area
.
Big linehaul trucks are destroying the Blue Mountains. Not only by their noise and dangerous speeds, but intimidating tail-gating to keep schedule and parking day and night outside residents homes.
At Mount Victoria in the Blue Mountains, the RTA and Blue Mountains Council approved of 24-hour Caltex Service Station and allowing truck drivers to use the adjacent highway shoulder to park and sleep. The shoulder was even widened to accommodate and encourage its use as a dodgy heavy vehicle rest area.
Since December 2003, Caltex at Mount Victoria was somehow allowed to become a round-the-clock operation with drivers of passing trucks, semi-trailers and B-doubles using the road shoulders to park their vehicles, often directly in front of residents’ front doors.
Local residents have complained to their members of parliament about the constant truck noise, of truck drivers leaving their rubbish by the side of the road and some even using front yards as a toilet – urinating and defecating!
In 2004, Liberal MP Duncan Gay, then Shadow Roads Minister, met with local community representatives at Mount Victoria, confirming that:
.
“The RTA, who are responsible for fatigue management need to provide proper rest points”
.
Now in 2011, with the Liberal Coalition in power, still nothing has been done. With speed being the main cause of at least half the recorded crashes, and the NRMA confirming a need for increased enforcement of heavy vehicle speed limits, Duncan Gay back in 2004 also advocated the installation of two new speed cameras ‘to convince motorists to take more care.’ Nup, not yet done either!
Then NSW Liberal Party Shadow Minster Duncan Gay (centre)
meeting Blue Mountains community representatives at Mount Victoria in 2004.
All care and no responsibility.
(Source: Blue Mountains Gazette)
.
The RTA, while headlong enthusiastic about channelling hundreds of millions into capital works widening sections of the highway, highway maintenance and traffic enforcement has always been the RTA’s unsexy Cinderella. Fatigue is one of the biggest causes of crashes for heavy vehicle drivers and the RTA is the delegated authority responsible for overseeing heavy vehicle driver fatigue management on New South Wales roads. This necessarily includes providing for the necessary rest facilities.
Suitable rest areas are important for heavy vehicle drivers to take long and short rest breaks, use amenities and check loads and vehicles. Heavy vehicle drivers must conform to fatigue management legislation that specifies strict resting requirements. In order to fulfil these requirements they require suitable rest area facilities that are regularly spaced along key freight routes. (Source: ^http://www.rta.nsw.gov.au/heavyvehicles/safety/hvfatigue/index.html)
.
RTA reneging on its duty to provide suitable Rest Areas
On 29th September 2008, Australia’s National Transport Commission (NTC) introduced new Heavy Vehicle Driver Fatigue laws national-wide. This came about as a consequence of many crashes involving heavy vehicles on designated national freight routes and fatigue identified as a key cause. The Audit of Rest Areas against National Guidelines (Austroads 2006) had found that many rest areas on freight routes across Australia (many in NSW) were deficient in being suitable to provide for appropriate rest breaks to address driver fatigue. One of the key freight routes is Great Western Highway /Mitchell Highway (Nepean River to Dubbo).
The NTC Guidelines for Major Heavy Vehicle Rest Areas includes the following principles:
Sites generally at no more than 100km intervals. Geographical and other physical constraints may require a range between 80 and 120km with the maximum limit generally being 120km.
Sites are to be provided on both sides of the road on those parts of the network that have high levels of demand, while those with lower levels of demand will not require provision on both sides of the road.
Sites are to be well signposted for heavy vehicle drivers and have suitable access for ingress and egress.
Sites are to have designated hard stand parking for heavy vehicles and an appropriate number of parking spaces dependent on demand.
Sites are to meet the basic needs of heavy vehicle drivers including provision of sealed pavements particularly for ingress and egress lanes/ramps, at least one toilet on each site, shade, shelter, rubbish bins and tables and chairs.
The RTA restated these two years later in its public document ‘RTA Strategy for Major Heavy Vehicle Rest Areas on Key Rural Freight Routes in NSW, January 2010‘.
A RTA model heavy vehicle rest area
‘Station creek’ rest area north of Karuah, Pacific Highway, NSW
.
A RTA dodgy heavy vehicle rest area
‘Mount Victoria’ outside resident properties #45-47, #49, #51, #143, #147, #151.
.
RTA dodgy (unconscionable) heavy vehicle rest area in front of residents’ homes
.
The RTA is obligated to provide for a Major Heavy Vehicle Rest Areas along the Great Western Highway accessible from each side of the highway at the intervals and with minimum standard of facilities as prescribed under the 2008 NTC Guidelines. Similarly, heavy vehicle drivers are required to have breaks at the frequencies, duration and under such conditions as prescribed under the 2008 Heavy Vehicle Driver Fatigue laws, basically to ensure that they ‘fit for duty’ and not too tired to drive safely. In NSW this is law under the Road Transport (General) Regulation 2005, which in relation to trucks applies to trucks with a Gross Vehicle Mass of 12 tonnes. Under the regulation, Basic Fatigue Management, starts with a solo driver required to have a 15 minute ‘stationary rest‘ after no more than 6 hours and 15 minutes at work, driving or otherwise. Longer work shifts have increasing rest break requirements. ‘Stationary rest‘ is defined as rest time that the driver spends out of the heavy vehicle or in an approved sleeper berth of a stationary regulated heavy vehicle.
.
However, along the Great Western Highway, which the RTA deems to be a ‘key rural freight route‘, the entire route of 200 km between outer Sydney (Penrith) and Orange provides no current rest area facilities, either westbound or eastbound that meet the 2008 NTC Guidelines. There should be two sites at no more than 100km apart, and on both sides of the highway, not just one side, with suitable access for ingress and egress. The sites should have stand parking for heavy vehicles and an appropriate number of parking spaces dependent on demand, as well as offering drivers a toilet, shade, shelter, rubbish bins and tables and chairs.
But the RTA simply doesn’t care. The RTA is prepared to ignore the problem of fatigue, to configure exemptions to avoid legalities and otherwise spend millions on the more politically sexy capital works upgrades. Three years after the NTC Guidelines, and many crashes later (involving heavy vehicles), the RTA has spent hundred of millions widening the Great Western Highway into a trucking expressway for bigger and more trucks to use, but has provided no facilities to address heavy vehicle driver fatigue. So the RTA is telling truck drivers to take proper breaks, but providing them with stuff all places to properly have a break. The RTA is negligent. It is also sly at claiming private enterprise facilities as its delivery of rest areas.
So the RTA is not just negligent. It is unethical.
No heavy vehicle facilities provide by the RTA for 200 km between Penrith and Orange
.
Along the Great Western Highway freight route between Penrith and Orange, a distance of over 200 km, the RTA provides no dedicated rest areas for heavy vehicles to the NTC Guidelines. The only RTA-built rest area is an unshaded paved vehicle check area just west of Faulconbridge with no facilities except two rubbish bins.
Only private enterprises are providing any form of adequate rest facility eastbound between Orange and Penrith that is accessible by heavy vehicles – the BP Service Station at Mount Lambie and the Caltex Service Station at Mount Victoria, but neither provide space for a heavy vehicle to park so the driver can sleep. The only heavy vehicle rest facility between westbound between Penrith and Orange is the Shell Service Station at Yetholm where there is ample off road parking, a roadside restaurant, toilets and an adjoining motor inn, but this is a commercial operation, not one provided by the RTA.
The RTA is thus contributory in culpability for heavy vehicle crashes due to driver fatigue along the Great Western Highway.
The RTA map below (which can be viewed full size by the link provided) shows the Great Western Highway from Penrith to Bathurst, with only two rest stops (‘Driver Reviver‘ sites in yellow) – one at Glenbrook (westbound only), and one at Faulconbridge (eastbound only). Neither are any more than roadside parking areas without facilities – big of the RTA!
RTA’s key rural freight route supposed ‘rest area’
for Heavy Vehicles at Faulconbridge – westbound access only.
(Photo by Editor 20111019, free in public domain)
No toilets
No shade
No shelter
No tables
Two bins, but who empties them and how often?
Not signposted as ‘Rest Area’ but as ‘Vehicle Checking Area’ I wonder why? (see next zoom photo)
.
RTA key rural freight route truck stop Faulconbridge
Not signposted as ‘Rest Area‘ but as ‘Vehicle Checking Area‘
.
Back to the January 2010 ‘RTA Strategy for Major Heavy Vehicle Rest Areas on Key Rural Freight Routes in NSW’, the RTA lists the facilities available or not available for heavy vehicle drivers along the Great Western Highway between Penrith and Orange in two tables – one Westbound (p.19), one Eastbound (p.20).
‘Victoria Pass Parking Area‘ is nothing but a widened road shoulder outside the Caltex Service Station at Mount Victoria outside residents homes. There is no shade or shelter. The Caltex Service Station provides for refuelling/vehicle inspection, but no place for drivers to sleep in the vehicles.
At the time of writing, there are no current facilities at River Lett Hill – the statement of there being ‘a rest area…on both sides of the road including a toilet‘ is false and misleading.
At the time of writing, the Raglan Service Centre (Shell) is currently closed and is under construction as a BP service station. It is to be a private facility, not provided by the RTA.
RTA: “No existing rest area meets or can be upgraded to meet the required 10 parking spaces in one site in this section (due to existing site constraints). The recommendation is for heavy vehicles to utilise and upgrade existing rest areas, in the interim, with the RTA investigating the potential, to construct in the long term, a major rest area as part of the Great Western Highway upgrade – Mount Victoria to Lithgow project.”
Ed: Given this will cost about $1 billion, it is unlikely to be funded or built any time soon, and so is a poor excuse by the RTA for doing nothing.
.
Eastbound (north side of the highway)
.
(Click to enlarge table)
.
There is no heavy vehicle facility between Orange and Bathurst. The RTA’s mention of upgrading the Larra Lee rest area is a proposal only, just to fill in space in the table to mask its failure to provide a facility.
‘Raglan Service Centre’
At the time of writing the ‘Raglan Service Centre is closed. It was a Shell Service Station for heavy vehicles. It is currently under construction as a BP Service Station, but it is not a facilty provided by the RTA. The RTA’s branding of this facility as a ‘Raglan Service Centre’ is deceptive and misleading.
.
Caltex Service Station at Mount Victoria
The only facility that the RTA mentions is “Parking bay east of Mount Victoria (existing). Food, toilet, shade, shelter provided at adjacent service station“.
This false and misleading. The facilities are not that of the RTA. The only service offered by the Caltex Service Station for heavy vehicles is refueling, vehicle inspection, a roadside cafe and toilet. There is no shade or shelter either on the Caltex site or along the road shoulders. The “parking bay” is the road shoulder. What a deceptive fabrication!
.
RTA’s excuse for perpetuating its Dodgy Rest Area at Mount Victoria
.
Standard Politic Tactic #1: Blame lack of Federal Government – will sit well with NSW Roads and Transport Minister of the day
.
RTA:
‘Implementation of the RTA’s Strategy for Major Heavy Vehicle Rest Areas on Key Rural Freight Routes in NSW is largely dependent on the availability of funding from the Federal Government.
The Federal Government’s 2008/09 Budget outlined that the Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government would provide $70 million across Australia over four years to fund a range of heavy vehicle safety initiatives. This funding is being allocated under the Heavy Vehicle Safety and Productivity Program (HVSPP) in two rounds with Round 1 covering 2008/09 – 2009/10 (complete) and Round 2 covering 2010/11 and 2011/12 (current). Under the HVSPP Guidelines a key consideration in allocating the funding is the extent to which state and territory governments commit to match the Federal Government’s funding contribution.
As part of Round 1 of the HVSPP, on 8 May 2009 the Federal Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government and the then State Minister for Roads announced $16M (50% Federal and 50% State) for NSW. Of this, $15M is currently being spent on 6 new rest areas and 22 rest area upgrades with the balance on bridge assessments for higher masses. In Round 1, NSW received 26.6% of $30 million available.
In applying the principles set in the RTA’s Guidelines for Provision of Major Heavy Vehicle Rest Areas a summary of needs across key rural freight routes in NSW is outlined in Table 2. Currently, on these routes 101 rest areas qualify as major heavy vehicle rest areas and 76 sites have been identified for enhancement. A total of 61 existing rest areas have been identified for upgrade to qualify as a major heavy vehicle rest area and 15 sites identified for new heavy vehicle rest areas. The strategic cost ($2009) to undertake required works that are not anticipated to be delivered as part of a major infrastructure proposal is estimated at around $50 to 60 million.
Delivery of works at all 76 identified sites is significantly higher than this strategic estimate.’
.
So what is the RTA’s ultimate excuse:
‘The RTA investigating the potential, in the long term, for a major rest area as part of the Great Western Highway upgrade – Mount Victoria to Lithgow.‘.(Ed: Given the $1 billion pre-blowout estimate, the RTA can focus on its more sexy capital works highway upgrades)..
Meanwhile, back at sleepless Mount Victoria, the Blue Mountains Council was told that the real estate profession had refused to place a valuation on the homes because of the problem and that the homes had been ‘effectively rendered worthless‘.
.
[Source: ‘Mt Vic’s truck dilemma’, by Len Ashworth, Lithgow Mercury, Tuesday 20081125]
There is a ‘baby boomer‘ political penchant to encourage more and more freight to travel by truck, which has dominated Australian Government transport planning for the past sixty years since World War II.
It is a short-term tactical stop-gap measure. Compared with rail freight, road linehaul for large volumes, over long distances, in the long term is price uncompetitive, and Peak Oil driving up fuel costs will eventually prove road linehaul a strategic economic blunder.
Speeding B-doubles increasingly dominate the highway over the Blue Mountains‘Woe betide anyone who gets in my way!‘
(Photo by Editor, free in public domain)
.
Yet ‘road-centric’ freight policy dominates the infrastructure planning, simply because it is being driven by the self-centred vested interests of the trucking industry – influenced (read ‘bought‘) by ongoing substantial monetary donations (read ‘bribes’) to the electoral campaigns of alternating Labor and Liberal governments. Visit ^http://democracy4sale.org/ and choose either:
Money talks, hence the political penchant to favour road freight. Whereas rail, entrenched as a government monopoly, has long denied any community say. Rail has become the Cinderella to Road where only a small honourary volunteer lobby, the Australasian Railway Association (ARA) has not the funds to compete against the collective corporate might of trucking donors. Read about the ARA: ^http://www.ara.net.au/site/index.php
The Liberal-Labor Party’s Auslink National Transport Plan since 2004 professed ‘a new strategic framework for the planning and funding of Australia’s roads and railways to meet long term economic and social needs.’ However, in reality the funding has all but gone into building bigger and more highways.
News is, we are about to enter the year 2012, so we should have advanced somewhat from post-war trucking thinking.
Yet in the Blue Mountains, west of Sydney, well over $1 billion is forecast to be spent to build a massive highway viaduct and tunnel; simply so that larger and faster trucks can cart freight, fuel and ore over the Blue Mountains and to bypass the village of Mount Victoria. The fact that a rail line following a similar route exists and has long been used to cart copious quantities of coal over the Blue Mountains, is ignored by a truck-centric political mindset. The planned Mount Victoria bypass is just one of the multiple ongoing highway widening sections being constructed by Roads and Traffic Authority (RTA) contractors over the Blue Mountains and ultimately extending from Penrith in Sydney’s outer metropolitan west to the New South Wales central-west regional town of Orange, 250km away.
Great Western Highway, Wentworth Falls, March 2010
This trucking section just $115,000,000 (pre-blowout estimate)
(Photo by Editor, free in public domain)
.
The widening of the highway has caused the destruction of much native vegetation and has ruined the bushland amenity of the villages and towns of the Central Blue Mountains. Construction has caused irreversible sediment contamination of many Blue Mountains waterways that drain from the highway ridgeline downstream into the Blue Mountains National Park and World Heritage Area.
Leura, January 2006
– collateral stormwater pollution of downstream creeks to serve the Trucking Expressway
(Photo by Editor, free in public domain, click photo to enlarge)
.
Since 1996, the widening of the Great Western Highway over the Blue Mountains has cost over a billion dollars already. Yet the highway runs parallel to an existing dual rail line, which for the most part runs right alongside one another. One justification argued for the massive cost and widening of the highway is to relieve traffic congestion for motorists, but there is a low population base in the Blue Mountains as settlement is confined to the ridgeline over the Blue Mountains where the highway and rail run together. Steep terrain either side prevent a large population expansion.
Katoomba, May 2009– collateral vegetation damage to serve the Trucking Expressway
(Photo by Editor, free in public domain, click photo to enlarge)
.
Before construction began, the only systemic traffic congestion on the highway was at weekends when tourists from Sydney ventured west in their cars. Spending billions to encourage domestic regional tourism has not been the real justification. The real justification has been and continues to be to encourage more truck freight along the Great Western Highway.
Yet the public is still waiting for a cost-benefit analysis, a calculation of any return on investment, an end-to-end journey analysis of the freight options, an holistic comparison to rail.
Instead, not only has there been a road-only freight focus, the trucks have got bigger. Governments are now permitting and encouraging the use of 19 metre ‘B-doubles’ along the highway. It is only a matter of time before 26 metre B-doubles turn up. In Victoria they are permitting B-triples – basically road-trains! Successive Labor and Liberal governments at both national and state level have maintained a truck-centric mindset since the 1980s when the NSW Greiner Government abandoned and close down much of the State’s rail infrastructure, including the closure of rail depots at Valley Heights and Junee.
This baby boomer political penchant has been encouraged and lauded by baby boomer himself, Bob Debus, long-time Labor politician for the NSW seat of Blue Mountains then the Federal seat of Macquarie, both covering the Blue Mountains region. Bob Debus has since retired, yet the Labor boomer mindset perpetuates with its truck-centric fervour.
.
“It is with dismay that I watch the Mountains stand by as the RTA fulfills Bob Debus’ promise of an “upgraded” highway (read Trucking Expressway) – by his own admission – built to carry 26m B-double trucks. The RTA admits that when the western container hubs are finished they will generate 4000 extra B-double movements per day. Parked end to end they would stretch 102 km – every day! Goondiwindi, Toowoomba and many other towns don’t allow them but we will see them roaring through every Mountains town – past schools, shops and homes.”
.
~ Dennis Plink, Hartley Vale (letter ‘B-double agenda‘ in Blue Mountains Gazette, 20090304, p.8.
.
The widening of the highway into a trucking expressway is wrecking the Blue Mountains. And certainly, those trucks have increased – in number, in size and length and in speed. These bigger, faster trucks are not policed. They are turning the Great Western Highway into a dangerous death zone.
Speeding B-Double truck overturns on Lapstone Hill
– at an already widened section of the Trucking Expressway
Zoom, zoom, zoom!
(Photo by Top Notch Video).
Last July, on the highway at Lawson near Queens Road, truck driven by a 66-year-old Murrangaroo man collided head-on with an eastbound car trapped a female passenger, followed by a separate collision between a truck and a car near Boland Ave at Springwood. On Friday, 29th July 2011 on Lapstone Hill the driver of a semi-trailer failed to negotiate a left-hand bend while travelling east and crashed into the concrete median barrier. The impact caused the truck’s trailer — containing a full load of bark — to tip over the barrier and slide a short distance into the path of a westbound Mitsubishi Lancer, driven by a 30-year-old Hazelbrook woman, who remained trapped before being rushed to Westmead Hospital. Traffic chaos ensued as all westbound lanes were closed for more than eight hours and one eastbound lane also shut for the clean-up operation. Lapstone Hill is one of the widened sections of the highway.
Increasingly we are reading in local newspapers of road trauma involving trucks. Across Australia, during the 12 months to the end of March 2009, 248 people died from 229 crashes involving heavy trucks or buses. These included:
Here are just some of the tragic road trauma incidents involving trucks across Australia over the past year:
.
‘Truck burns at Yelgun’ … two days ago!
.
Flames engulf a postal truck at Yelgun on the NSW north coast on December 18, 2011. The driver stopped the truck after noticing smoke pouring from the engine bay. He collected his belongings and departed the vehicle before the flames took hold.
.
[Source: ‘Truck burns at Yelgun”, by Kalindi Starick, ABC, 20111220, ^http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-12-19/flames-engulf-a-postal-truck-at-yelgun-on-the-nsw-north-coast/3737752]
.
‘Teenage driver killed in truck collision’…two days ago
.
One woman was killed and five people were injured in two accidents involving B-double trucks.
Engineers were called to the scene of a dramatic accident on the Gateway Motorway at Boondall in Brisbane about midday yesterday, when a B-double truckexploded after it and a car collided.
On the Bruce Highway near Rockhampton, a 19-year-old woman died and four people were injured when a car and a B-double truck collided. Police said the station wagon tried to turn into the southbound lanes of theBruce Highway at Marmor just before 8pm on Friday when the car and truck, whichwas travelling in the northbound lane, collided. The 19-year-old driver was killed, while her three female passengers, two aged19 and one aged 18, were taken to Rockhampton hospital. The three are in a stable condition. The 65-year-old driver of the B-double was taken to hospital for precautionary treatment and has been released.
.
[Source: ‘Teenage driver killed in truck collision’, by Date: December 18 2011, Ellen Lutton, 20111218, Sydney Morning Herald, ^http://www.smh.com.au/queensland/teenage-driver-killed-in-truck-collision-20111217-1p0ax.html?skin=text-only]
.
‘Truck crash closes Melbourne freeway’
Melbourne’s Monash Freeway is closed in both directions after a semi-trailer crashed into a bridge pylon in the suburb of Mulgrave in the city’s south-east.
Two people have died in a crash on the Pacific Highway near Yamba on the NewSouth Wales north coast.
A 62-year-old man and a 51-year-old woman from the Leeton area died when two cars collided about 11:00am (AEDT) today. A woman and three children who were in the other car have been taken to the Coffs Harbour Hospital. Police say a truck driver who was involved in the accident but failed to stop, was later pulled over at Ballina. Police are interviewing him. Rebecca Walsh, from the Traffic Management Centre, says the Pacific Highway is closed in both directions and vehicles are being diverted along the Summerland Way at Grafton.
‘Chemical alert after truck rolls in Blue Mountains’
.
Fire crews are battling to contain a major chemical spill on the Great Western Highway at Katoomba in the Blue Mountains, after a truck overturned and 20,000 litres of a bright green industrial chemical poured out.
Protective bunds have been built around the spill site to stop the chemical, which is possibly a type of hydraulic fluid, reaching the iconic Leura cascades. The chemical is described as biodegradable, but it can be a toxic irritant to skins and eyes if touched.
Six fire crews were at the site at 5pm, plus a hazardous materials unit from St Marys, a spokesman for Fire and Rescue NSW said.National Parks rangers, Blue Mountains council staff and fire crews are monitoring the extent of the spilled fluid, some of which entered the drainage system. Council staff have poured gravel around the edge of the spill area to try and contain it. The truck rolled over at about 2pm, and the driver’s condition is unknown, although he or she was understood to not have been trapped in the vehicle.
Editor: Subsequent reports by a Katoomba resident reported observing the green hydraulic fluid flow in quantities down Govetts Creek. The contaminant would probably have ended up in the World Heritage Area of the creek within the Grose Valley, but would the RTA, Blue Mountains Council or the National Parks Service care?
‘.
‘Truck overturns at Tabbimoble’ (Maclean)
.
A woman suffered minor injuries when the truck she was driving overturned on the Pacific Highway at Tabbimoble yesterday morning.
The B-double truck carrying general freight was heading north on the Pacific Highway and was about 2km south of the New Italy complex and 25km north of Maclean when it rolled shortly before 5am. The 46-year-old woman who was at the wheel of the Volvo semi-trailer complained of back pains and was taken by ambulance to Lismore Base Hospital. The highway was partially blocked for four hours while emergency service cleared away the debris. The accident occurred on what has become a notoriously black stretch of road where several fatalities have occurred in recent years. .
M4 Motorway (aka Trucking Expressway) on approach to the Blue Mountains
Photo: Adam Hollingworth
.
One man has died after a truck veered into a group of cyclists on the M4 motorway.
Fatigue may have caused a truck driver to veer into the breakdown lane and mow down a group of cyclists, killing one, on the M4 in Sydney’s west. Police said a group of four cyclists were riding in the breakdown lane of the M4 near the Northern Road overpass at South Penrith when they were struck by a B-double truck about 7.40am today. A male cyclist died and the three others sustained serious injuries. The injured were taken to Nepean Hospital.
A WorkCover spokesman said a preliminary investigation was under way to ascertain whether driver fatigue caused the accident. Police said the male truck driver was taken to hospital for mandatory blood and urine tests. Police are investigating the cause of the crash.
‘Overtaking gamble cost highway driver his life, police believe’
.
One person has died after a truck carrying chemicals exploded after colliding with a car on the NSW north coast this morning.
Police believe a car driver’s early morning gamble in trying to pass a B-double truck on a no-overtaking stretch of the Pacific Highway cost him his life. The sedan was travelling southbound at Warrell Creek just before 4am when it appeared to pull out into the oncoming lane to overtake the truck. It then crashed head-on into a second, northbound, B-double carrying chemicals, Senior Constable Brian Carney of the Mid North Coast Crash Investigation Units aid.
The Pacific Highway on the New South Wales north coast will be closed until New Year’s Day while crews clear a fuel tanker that exploded and killed the driver.
The tanker hauling 40,000 litres of fuel overturned and exploded on what is regarded by truckies as a notorious stretch of the highway, near Tintenbar, 10 km north of Ballina.
Authorities have set up a one-kilometre exclusion zone around the burning tankerand more than 100 firefighters equipped with breathing apparatus were sent to the scene.The ambulance service says the truck driver was killed in the blast, while two people have been freed from a nearby car after being trapped when powerlines came down on their vehicle. The second trailer of the B-double was thrown into a paddock where it leaked fuel into a nearby wetland, and police still cannot get to the cabin of the burnt truck where the driver’s body remains inside.
Another tanker driver, Gary, says the driver is one of their own but they do not know who.”It is sad to be holed up on the side of the road like this. And it’s sad for a driver that’s not going to go home to his family,” he said.
The truck was laden with diesel and unleaded fuel, which has now been mostly contained. Police say they will not be able to assess the damaged road until the scorched truck is moved, but they expect the Pacific Highway to be closed for the rest of today. Six other trucks are banked up behind the accident site unable to turn around.
‘Truck lobby donations seem more important than people’s lives!‘
.
~ Dennis Plink, loc. cit.
Native Angophora 300 years old.The RTA’s Environment Manager says it’s in the way – Chip it!
– collateral damage for the Trucking Expressway
…note railway line on left
The following article was first published in the Blue Mountains Gazette newspaper 20060122:
.Blue Gum Forest, Grose Valley, Blue Mountains
[Source: AK Bushwalks, ^http://mywebdots.com/bushwalks/?page_id=26]
.
A tall moist open forest dominated by Blue Gum (Eucalyptus deanii) characterises the famous ‘Blue Gum Forest’ at the junction of the Grose River and Govetts Creek in the Grose Wilderness.
But there would be no Blue Gum Forest if it were not for the efforts of a dedicated band of very fit bushwalkers seventy odd years ago. In 1931, under the leadership of Myles Dunphy, the ‘save Blue Gum Forest’ campaign was ignited by the threat by a leaseholder on the Grose River/Govetts Creek junction wanting to clear the icon stand of tall blue gums for cattle grazing. Consisting of members of the Wildlife Preservation Society, the Sydney Bush Walkers and the Mountain Trails Club, they formed the Blue Gum Forest Committee. Hard campaigning secured purchase of the forest for £130, which they handed back to the Crown and on 2nd September 1932 was proclaimed a recreation reserve. They unknowingly in their bold defence of the Blue Gum Forest, established what has become known as Australia’s ‘cradle of conservation‘.
It took another 27 years of wilderness campaigning for The Blue Mountains National Park to be proclaimed in 1959 and the Blue Gum Forest incorporated two years later.
Despite deserved World Heritage listing in 2000, the Grose has again come under threat. This time last year, tonnes of caramel sediment from highway upgrade stockpiling at Leura started choking Govett’s Creek. Seems the RTA simply underestimated Mountains weather.
To the credit of Leura residents, grassroots leadership has again emerged to defend the Grose and to hold the RTA accountable. A year hence, council has responded with a working party to develop remedial actions, although ‘in-creek’ action remains wanting. Abundant photographic evidence and a moral obligation warrant the RTA fund ecological remediation.
Caramel-coloured construction sediment from the RTA’s Trucking Expressway
Leura, Blue Mountains 2006
(click photo to enlarge, the click again to enlarge again)
.
But where was the custodial manager of the Grose while the damage was being reported? The Department of Environment and Conservation (National Parks) and the environmental enforcer (the EPA) have been conspicuously muted to environmental breaches caused by their sister government agency.
RTA sediment from the upstream Trucking Expressway development polluting Govetts Creek inside the Blue Mountains World Heritage Area.
Photo of Editor in Govetts Creek, Leura, Blue Mountains 2006
B-Double truck plying the Great Western Highway
New South Wales, Australia
(Photo by Editor 20121005, free in public domain, click image to enlarge)
[Source: ‘Have Your Say’, Bang the Table Pty Ltd (ACN 127 001 236)
– a public relations consultancy outsourced by the NSW Government to deal with communities (voters)
Clinical and characterless trunk routing in the UK
Grose Valley, Blue Mountains
(Photo by Editor 20060625, free in public domain)
Great Western Highway across the Blue Mountains
(National Trucking Route 32)
(Photo by Editor 20121005, free in public domain)
British Motorways: conceived, designed and built principly for road freight
[Source: ‘FTA man joins DfT for lorry charge development’, 20121004, by Chris Tindall, ^http://www.commercialmotor.com/latest-news/fta-s-ch, accessed 20121005]
Great Western Highway bulldozed out to four lanes at Katoomba
(Photo by The Habitat Advocate 20090501, free in public domain)
Trunk Route 32 starts from industrial areas and is designed purely to route trucking
The Route numbering designation has nothing to do with ordinary motorists; such association is political spin.
Goodbye Bullaburra – set to be the next victim of the Trucking Expressway
(Photo by Editor 20120103, free in public domain, this is a photo for the historical record)
Trunk Route 32, somewhat further west
Wentworth Falls bushland amenity disappearing for the Trucking Expressway
.
Britain’s M5 truck crash near Taunton, Somerset, November 2011
[Source: ‘M5 crash investigation could go on into the new year’, Mirror (UK),
^http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/m5-crash-investigation-could-go-276941
Photo by SWNS]
[Source: ‘Gone too soon’, by journalist Damien Madigan, 20110914, Blue Mountains Gazette (newspaper), p.1]
[Source: ‘Highway mayhem’, by journalist Shane Desiatnik, 20110803, Blue Mountains Gazette (newspaper), p.1]
Linehaul Trucking and pedestrians don’t mix
Trucking Economics does not overrule!
[Source: Blue Mountains Gazette (newspaper]
.
.
Speeding B-Double overturned at Lapstone on an already widened 4-laned section of the converted Trucking Expressway
[Source Blue Mountains Gazette, 20110729]
.
They used to be called ‘Road Trains‘
B-Triples up to 36.5 metres long have been operating in South Australia under permit on a restricted route network for a number of years.
[Source: Gazetted Operation of B-Triples in South Australia,
^http://www.transport.sa.gov.au/pdfs/freight/09_11_update/B_Triple_Information_Bulletin_Oct_2011.pdf , Accessed 20121005 >Read Bulletin (30kb)]
