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House of Assembly - Fifty-First Parliament, Third Session (51-3)
2009-07-14 Daily Xml
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Grievance Debate

GOMERSAL ROAD

Mr VENNING (Schubert) (15:11): I, too, congratulate the member for Heysen on her elevation into history in South Australia. To be the first woman leader of any major parliamentary party in South Australia is fantastic indeed. I am sure that the Hon. Joyce Steele, up there, would be very proud indeed of the member for Heysen today, and she would approve wholeheartedly, as we all do. We wish her the very best in this office, and may she be the first female premier of South Australia.

I have made numerous speeches in this place about Gomersal Road. Sir, you are sick of hearing about Gomersal Road, but I have to raise it again. The current unsafe condition of the road, sadly, has led me to raise this matter again after a brief period of time. In the past few weeks the potholes along the road have become increasingly worse. More and more appear each day and they are growing in size and depth, posing a huge safety risk to motorists travelling along that road.

My office has been inundated with complaints over the last two weeks from constituents. People are firstly concerned about the safety of those using this road, and, secondly, they are angry about the damage being caused to their vehicles as a result of driving through these large, deep potholes in the asphalt surface of the road. Some of the potholes are so large that I believe they could cause a fatal or serious car accident. People are having accidents, and people have hit them, blowing tyres and destroying wheels.

The road has become increasingly busy since the Liberal government, under minister Laidlaw, had it bituminised and upgraded in 2002. It has been a very busy road ever since. However, I do not think anybody could have predicted that it would serve such volume of traffic as it is—over eight times the predictions. Trucks, school buses, local commuters and tourists, who are unfamiliar with the road, all travel along it on a regular basis. Gomersal Road—

An honourable member interjecting:

Mr VENNING: History is repeating itself: we have ex-speaker Gunn in the chair, and it is great to see you there, sir. Gomersal Road—

Members interjecting:

Mr VENNING: Yes, I am overcome by this, sir. Gomersal Road can now be classed as a major arterial road. I am sure that once the Northern Expressway is completed it will become even busier, if that is possible. The 14 kilometre road is largely managed and maintained by the Light Regional Council and a small portion by the Barossa Council. These councils are constantly repairing the road and trying to plug the potholes that are continually appearing. However, to use the words of my constituents, doing this is like putting a band-aid over a shark bite.

I observed council's road crew out in the rain on Saturday filling wheelbarrow-sized holes with hot bitumen mix. The dirt that they put in got wet, and it was all being squished out, so they had to replace it with bitumen. It is becoming increasingly evident that maintaining the condition of this road to appropriate standards is well beyond the capacity of the council. The state government needs to reclassify this road straight away and take over its care and maintenance.

In January this year the Light Regional Council put in a submission for the 2009 special local roads funding round for road pavement and bitumen sealing rehabilitation works along Gomersal Road. I wrote a letter of support to go with its application, which sought $1 million. Its application was ranked No. 3 on the list of funding priorities but, to date, it has not yet found out whether it has been successful.

In May, the transport department agreed to contribute $250,000 towards the rehabilitation of Gomersal Road, if the council was successful with its application and provided that the local councils of Light and Barossa also contributed funds. This is a copout and an insignificant amount compared with what is needed.

Between 2001 and 2002, the former Liberal government spent $5.624 million on Gomersal Road; the Rann Labor government, between 2002 and 2003, invested a measly $110,000, and there has been nothing major since then. However, whether the Light Regional Council is successful in obtaining the money through the local road fund is not the point; the issue is that the council does not have the capacity to undertake the ongoing maintenance required to keep Gomersal Road to an acceptable safe standard.

The road needs to be transferred immediately to state government control, and in the past I have written to the minister about this, both in October last year and again very recently. He said that Department of Transport officers had met with both councils to discuss a potential transfer arrangement, and he anticipated that a joint proposal will be submitted to the Local Roads Advisory Committee by the end of this year. It is not good enough for the safety of South Australians.

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