Introduction

The public consultation process for this freeway extension proposal is seriously flawed. No alternatives to roads and tunnels were ever considered, even during the initial phase. None of the information provided deals with the impact on local roads, air pollution at the city end, urban densities and urban planning, and the freeway itself once CityLink tolls come into effect.

Greenhouse gas emissions will increase, while patronage of existing local rail and bus services will decrease.

Government inconsistencies

The credibility of the Bracks Government is at stake if the current truncated assessment process approves the freeway extension because:

1) the Minister for Transport has already conceded that the extension would worsen traffic and pollution problems in the inner city and promised a “far and wide reaching examination” of the issue  (Metropolitan News, 29.3.00)

2) in the same interview, the Minister also refused to create a new statutory authority to oversee private tram, train and bus operators. His claim that existing transport and planning bureaucrats could handle the task begs the obvious question, “Then why haven't they done so?”

The task in question is not just to “oversee” the present $800 million a year State public transport subsidy but to use this considerable financial clout of the State to coordinate and integrate this transport system so that it serves the public efficiently instead of competing internally with itself.

For its size, Melbourne’s public transport system is one of the least punctual, least efficient and least integrated in Australia; much less functional than Sydney’s, despite the topography.

3) ALP policy promised an environmental assessment on all major projects, yet no new EES is to be required in this case. This is despite the fact that the 1987 EES that the Government is relying on instead dealt with a 4-lane divided road, not a 6-lane freeway that is likely to carry twice the traffic envisaged 13 years ago.

The 1987 EES also under-estimated the Hoddle Street exit bottleneck (which the ALP has recognised) and modelled local air quality assuming the Mullum Mullum valley was a flat plain.

4) The Government is committed to developing a Metropolitan Strategy and an Outer Eastern Regional Transport Plan—obviously, any major infrastructure projects in this region should be frozen until these policy studies have been completed.

Community health-danger from particulates

Particulates (PM10 and especially PM2.5) are now regarded as the most dangerous pollutants from motor vehicles, with a disproportionate amount of PM2.5 being emitted from diesel engines. The effects of airborne particles are cumulative and there is no safe level: every 10ug increase in their concentration in ambient air results in a 1 % increase in local mortality, as the EPA pointed out in its submission on the Scoresby Transport Corridor EES in September 1998.

A string of studies have now been done that link vehicle pollution to increased mortality and cancer. The latest is a Denver (Colorado) study reported in the February issue of the Journal of the Air and Waste Mangement Association, which shows that children living near arterial roads are at greater risk of developing cancer, including leukemia.

Motor vehicle pollution causes around 400 premature deaths each year in cities like Melbourne and Sydney.

In terms of pollution problems in the inner city, EPA data from monitoring stations near major roads (like Hoddle St., Collingwood) regularly show levels of particulates that exceed NEPM standards. Even six years ago, when traffic levels were around 15 lower than today, the 1994 EPA-VicRoads study on the South-Eastern Freeway found particulate levels up to 64ug/m3 near Tooronga Road. The 24-hr NEPM standard is 50ug/m3.

The City of Yarra covers most of the eastern inner city and, according to the Department of Human Services, total respiratory disease as a cause of death is 70 % higher for Yarra than for Victoria as a whole. Yarra’s overall mortality rate is 30 % more than Victoria’s and 60 % higher than for Melbourne’s lowest suburbs. Cancer of the trachea, bronchus and lungs as a cause of death for all adults over 15 years old in Yarra is over twice the Victorian average.

There is clearly an imperative for health and transport authorities to plan for a decrease in motor vehicle pollution by every means possible, including reducing the need for their use by establishing other transport alternatives.

Tunnel ventilation and filtration

There is nothing in the public information about the freeway extension that covers these issues, which could assume considerable importance if either of the longer tunnel options is chosen.

There is no mention of the number, cost, siting, or filtration of ventilation stacks for the long tunnel options. Some sectors of the community seem to believe that vent stacks will be provided automatically, and that the emissions will be filtered before being pumped out over the Mullum Mullum valley. No plume modelling has been done to show how these emissions might behave in such varied topography, and both Transurban and EPA have yet to admit that suitable filtration technology exists, let alone agree to its installation in the CityLink vent stacks.

Emergency public exit stairs are also not discussed. With CityLink, for example, these had also been omitted from the design and had to be added later at public expense. In this case, where will they lead—into the Mullum Mullum bush?

Freeways and transport efficiency: an urban myth

Connecting the Eastern Freeway by several kilometres through to Ringwood is likely to inject a further 15,000 to 20,000 vehicles per day through growing bottlenecks into the inner suburbs of Collingwood, Fitzroy and Carlton, given that traffic on the freeway already exceeds predicted levels.

Even in VicRoads terms, the extension makes little sense without streamlining the road system at each end that it connects to—i.e., building the $900 million Scoresby Bypass to the south-east and a tunnel system at the city end to connect through to the Tullamarine freeway without destroying what’s left of inner city amenity.

In fact, traffic modelling by VicRoads to forecast design volumes for the freeway extension in 2011 assumes that the Scoresby Freeway is constructed south from the Maroondah highway (“Eastern Freeway Extension”, 14 Sept. 1999, Ref.0834, point 3.1). These projections of traffic volume are also useless in assessing the real impact of the extension proposal because they are limited to a comparison between single and dual lane ramp configurations and auxiliary lane requirements.

The overseas experience of cities like Los Angeles has led city planners to end their reliance on more freeways as the answer to mass commuting and instead to go back to rail. Even Melbourne’s experience shows the same pattern: new freeways inititally facilitate traffic flow, but at the same time create new bottlenecks, especially as relatively more traffic is attracted to use the new freeway.

The most recent extension of the Eastern Freeway out to Springvale Road is a perfect illustration. The dramatic increase in usage cut traffic speed over the last 10km into the city from 84kph down to 63kph, according to an RACV study done in July 1998.

The study noted that although the overall trip from Springvale Road to Hoddle Street improved by 2 minutes, the original section of freeway from Doncaster Road to Hoddle Street took 4 minutes longer to cover! In other words, for the majority of commuters, the daily drive to work takes longer, and more vehicles stream into Collingwood and Fitzroy.

Modern urban living—reclaiming communities from the car

At some stage, this farce must stop. We are now running up against the limits imposed by urban living. More and more people want to live in the inner city; medium-density dwellings have proliferated and been encouraged by government. Yet car parking is at a premium; inner-city communities are strangled as streets reach new levels of congestion; and air pollution is getting worse as the continually escalating number of vehicle kilometres travelled per day outweighs the effect of more vehicles having efficient pollution control systems (catalytic converters).

“Manhattan-style” living in the inner city requires enhanced public transport and greatly reduced car ownership and use, including less through-traffic.

Around $300 million (roughly the cost of the freeway extension options) could provide train links out to Rowville and Doncaster instead. As well as providing an efficient commuter link to these areas, this alternative would produce less air pollution and greenhouse gases, and significantly reduce traffic congestion at the city end of the Eastern Freeway and on Springvale Road and Stud Road, further reducing pollution levels there.

Conclusion

RACOF considers that the current proposal to extend the Eastern Freeway requires much more extensive public consultation than the six weeks allowed so far, especially given the impact of the proposal at the city end and its implications for plans for the Scoresby Bypass. If taxpayers as a whole are to pay for the extension, then democracy (and common sense) dictates that all impacts on every community affected must be evaluated.

In line with ALP policy, there must be a new EES and either an independent review or the completion of the Government¹s Outer Eastern Regional Transport Plan to investigate how best to facilitate the movement of people within the metropolitan area, looking at the effects on adjacent communities and considering all possible modes of transport (not just road options), as well as their social, environmental and economic costs and benefits.

This must occur before any more decisions are made on major transport infrastructure projects.

This approach to transport policy is nothing radical. A move away from the car towards public transport is the growing trend in most OECD countries, even those which have tighter emissions standards than Australia. It is worth noting that our major cities already have air pollution as bad as Los Angeles, on a per capita basis.

Ian Wood
 

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