I recently spoke in the Parliament
regarding the lack of road infrastructure and future planning for the
Foxwell Road
interchange in
Upper Coomera.
There are
currently six schools, with plans for a seventh, within a five-kilometre radius
of the
Foxwell Road
interchange: The road is also used by residents to access the M1, and by
tourists as the designated entry to Dreamworld.
Over 4,000 children are trying to arrive
and leave this area at precisely the same time. On any given day, the
northbound off ramp that leads to Days Road is fully congested, leaving parents
stranded and queuing—often at a complete standstill—down a 110
kilometres-per-hour lane of the Pacific Motorway.
By 2013, there will be over 7½ thousand
students attending these schools. All of these will arrive in the area between
8 am and 9 am every weekday try to exit the area between 3 pm and 3.30 pm.
There are plans to build 60,000 homes at the end of
Foxwell Road. Clearly without some
intervention, the congestion problem in this are will compound.
The concept-planning stage to improve the
interchange is due to start ‘sometime after 2008’, according to the local State
Member’s office. If Main Roads starts concept planning in 2008, the best the
local community can look forward to is completion by 2017, if the progress of
the
Nielsens Road
interchange in Nerang is any indication of how long these things take. This
problem is compounded by the reallocation of $455m announced during the Federal
Election campaign to fix the M1 predominantly on the Gold Coast being directed
instead to
Logan
City.
Currently, parents who live on
Foxwell Road and
who make the journey across the highway overpass to drop their children at
school must plan for a one hour trip. This trip, without congestion, takes no
longer than 10 minutes.
I am calling on the Bligh and the Rudd
Labor governments to allocate money now to fix the
Foxwell Road interchange.
By 2013, the
Foxwell Road
interchange will be used by 60,000 homes, a planned shopping centre, commuters
for the local train station and over 7,000 schoolchildren—all on one
interchange.
This is not an isolated problem.
There are congestion problems throughout the Gold Coast that are not being
addressed, and compounded by our population growth. Locals regularly contact my
office voicing their concerns on the lack of action in this regard. Ours
is the fastest growing region of
Australia. This problem requires
action and forward planning now.
