Vic Roads

The Victorian Government is turning Melbourne into a junior version of Los Angeles without a proper cost-benefit analysis. Photo: Jason South

Before the 2002 state election I was asked to chair a meeting of Banyule citizens who had good reason to believe the Bracks government was planning to build a freeway connecting the Metropolitan Ring Road to what is now EastLink.

The Heidelberg Town Hall was full. The audience was sufficiently large and threatening that the then transport minister, Peter Batchelor, and local ALP state member Craig Langdon each promised that it wouldn't happen. From the platform, I saw the tension go out of the audience.

How easy it is to gull the electorate. The freeway was on the VicRoads agenda even before the first stage of the ring road was built. It was classic salami tactics - one slice at a time.

Photograph of Edgar Creek Site 15 Edgars Creek Waterfall & Geological Structure in Coburg below a newly sited Kodak development. Source: Merri Creek Management Committee: http://www.mcmc.org.au/content/view/164/261/

Once again, Northern Suburbs Federal Labor MP, Kelvin Thomson, has come through to represent the public against the falsely positive coasian economics of Victoria's grubby and despotic government!

He has written to Victorian Environmental Assessment Council's inquiry into metropolitan Crown land asking for the land to be given to the Council gratis as long as it is kept as public parkland. Thomson's arguments impressively cogent, demonstrating far better grasp of biology than the average Melbourne parliamentarian, and serious students of climate change would benefit from reading them. Moreland Council has also asked for the land to be kept public and undeveloped.

by Sheila Newman and Richard Laverack

Why build more roads now?

Why on earth, with petroleum supplies not meeting demand and oil prices through the roof, are we still engaging in public-private partnerships with road builders???

Australia is currently set to be criss-crossed by new roads, tunnels and tollways. A case in point, which we have studied is the SEITA Eastlink tollway, which is being built by ConnectEast in a private-public partnership with the Victorian Government.

So, why is Victoria engaged in massive road construction just now? And, why are we persisting with Eastlink, all the way down the Mornington Peninsular when we could simply stop it now?

We found some strange answers to our question towards the end of a SEITA document called, "Frankston Bypass Environment Effects Statement, Strategic Transport Modelling Technical, dated 3rd March 2008, in "Clause 5.7 - Impacts of Fuel Price Changes."