Townsville Road and Infrastructure Projects

[Theville01]

Crossing the Bohle

LIZ McKINNON

16Aug07

TOWNSVILLE'S biggest ever road project is taking shape as contractors prepare to hit the biggest obstacle – crossing the Bohle River.

In an exclusive interview, Premier Peter Beattie yesterday revealed the next stage of the $119 million Ring Road was about to start with two new bridges to be built over the Bohle River and Little Bohle River.

It will take more than a year to build and the Government has given twin cities residents naming rights of the new city crossings.

Thuringowa MP Craig Wallace said it was the community's chance to keep the name Thuringowa alive before it was lost when the twin cities' councils became one in March.

Mr Beattie said the work, which included driving 35m piles into the ground, was scheduled to start in September.

He said the piles had started being delivered so work could start on the 200m-long, eight-span bridge over the Bohle River and the 90m, five-span bridge over the Little Bohle.

The project is set to be finished by September, 2008.

"The community is no doubt looking forward to the benefits this project will bring by providing a more direct link to the Bruce Highway north of Townsville, via Shaw Road," Mr Beattie said.

"The Ring Road also means traffic not destined for Townsville can bypass the city's urban areas.

"It will provide a more direct route for many suburbs to access major facilities such as the Townsville Hospital, James Cook University and Lavarack Army base."

More than 82,000 man hours have already been clocked up by the more than 85 employees working on the project since April.

The 7km route will link the Douglas Arterial Bridge at Riverway Drive to Herveys Range Rd and extend to Shaw Rd.

Already a 7m-high embankment has been built on the southern approach to the Herveys Range Rd/Ring Road intersection.

Transport Minister Paul Lucas said more than 100,000 cubic metres of locally excavated material had been used to build the embankment and one for the northern approaches.

He said bridge piles had been driven in on the southern approach for the Herveys Range Ring Rd overpass.

While excitement was building on the new route, Herbert MP Peter Lindsay announced that Federal Roads Minister Jim Lloyd would visit Townsville to face the heat on the North's Bruce Highway campaign.

Mr Lindsay said, as promised, Mr Lloyd would visit to meet the members of the road summit on September 5.

"This is an important meeting and I stand shoulder to shoulder with mayors seeking to have the problems on the Bruce Highway resolved," Mr Lindsay said.

Mr Wallace said he would pressure Mr Lloyd to answer their calls for the $2 billion needed to fix the deteriorating stretch from Townsville to Cairns.
SWEET

[Gertzy]

Here are a couple of pics i took on Friday.

[Oriolus]

Anyone got the new Townsville UBD (9th edition)? The Douglas Arterial is included as a dinky di freeway - all green and everything, looks very cool Then the next two sections currently under construction are included as a proposed freeway with green outline.

Originally Posted by Gertzy

All i can say is that the Shaws rd section is underway, and apparantly there are Construction cranes out that way as well, wouldn't surprise me, theiss is building the road and they use Hammerheads for building bridges.

Really??? Can anyone confirm this? Are there actually hammerheads out there? I assumed they would have been big caterpillar cranes, tower cranes seem very restrictive for building a road.

[Gertzy]

Sweet cant wait to see that then, um thats what i heard from a source from CTQ (Construction Training Queensland), but i dont know if he meant cranes just as any usual mobile crane, or Construction crane, but it wouldnt actually surprise me if there were cause theiss uses Tower Cranes for most of their bridge works.

[Avatar]

Originally Posted by Oriolus

Some pics from the bridge walk open day on Sunday.

Plenty of people there

I really don't know why they bother. There is no middle ground, either leave freeways sidings as plain possibly patterned concrete or go all out like some the freeways in Melbourne around the city. This bullshit with green leaves and a yellow ribbon is a MAJOR eyesore if you ask me, it would have looked better with an abstract press into the concrete and left plain than this tizzy kistch bullshit. What do you all think?

Good to see Townsville is getting some decent roads investment however,

[Gertzy]

I wouldnt exactly call it decent when they're calling this thing a Motorway. I dont mind the green leaf pattern, its more the ribbon that i dont exactly like, maybe if they used a different colour or something.

[Avatar]

Its all foul.

[Wezza]

I really don't take much notice of the barriers when i'm driving along there. Doesn't worry me at all.

[Gertzy]

Originally Posted by Oriolus

Anyone got the new Townsville UBD (9th edition)? The Douglas Arterial is included as a dinky di freeway - all green and everything, looks very cool Then the next two sections currently under construction are included as a proposed freeway with green outline.

Yep, i got that one yesterday, seeing 'The Ring Road' in Green Freeway designation is quite cool, i think they've been abit anxious with some of the new streets, especially Kingston Park at Deeragun, half the streets havent been built yet and they've got it designated in White, same with Bushland Beach, but its good to see that they've included up and coming land realeases.

Originally Posted by Avatar

Its all foul.

Yes probably, but as Wezza said, most people dont really notice it, and it'll still be the case when they duplicate this thing.

[Theville01]

its starting to come along now n looks good i drove past today

[Jean Luc]

Originally Posted by Avatar

I really don't know why they bother. There is no middle ground, either leave freeways sidings as plain possibly patterned concrete or go all out like some the freeways in Melbourne around the city. This bullshit with green leaves and a yellow ribbon is a MAJOR eyesore if you ask me, it would have looked better with an abstract press into the concrete and left plain than this tizzy kistch bullshit. What do you all think?

^ Avatar - Ozscrapers' resident art aficionado/arbiter/cognoscente/commentator/connoisseur/dilettante/pundit! Lol!

[Avatar]

Originally Posted by Jean Luc

^ Avatar - Ozscrapers' resident art aficionado/arbiter/cognoscente/commentator/connoisseur/dilettante/pundit! Lol!

You know I'm right, it looks foul.

[Gertzy]

I saw this today actually, spent the day orienteering at Hervey's Range. Its coming along good and its a real hive of activity at the moment.

[Theville01]

i just drove past it, but gertzy do u have any details on the project

[Gertzy]

No, the only information i got about it is from the Main Roads website, and i forgot to mention, they're trying to get $100 million to fund the Duplication of the Douglas Arterial as part of Auslink II.

[Theville01]

Yeah I heard about that 60 million n 100million to duplicate, silly silly

[Gertzy]

I think it also includes the on and offramps for Riverside boulevard, as well as other costs including extra signage, median barriers, stronger noise barriers etc etc.

[Theville01]

thatll look like a proper motorway if they do that

[Theville01]

They have started contruction on and off ramps at shaws road on the entrance into the motorway, with laying a bit of tarr

[Theville01]

Also most of the land has been cleared with the closure of becks road I believe