A P T N S W logo

Action for Public Transport (N.S.W.) Inc.

More RTA lies - Lane Cove Tunnel

posted Saturday 16 November 2002
Letter in Sydney's North Shore Times, Friday November 15, 2002:

"Tunnel, no vision -

The statement in the North Shore Times (25/9/02, page 10) by Paul Willoughby, Director of Communications at the RTA, that a final toll on the Lane Cove Tunnel will be determined when the project is finalised and a contract awarded, is breathtaking in its audacity and symptomatic of the lies and lack of candour which the RTA has presented to the public in the original EIS and now the Preferred Activity Report.

The whole objective of my report was to show that a six lane tunnel would by the RTA's own figures cost in the vicinity of $1.2 billion and that an investment of this magnitude would necessitate a toll in the vicinity of $5 to $6 each way when the project was completed in 2006. The EIS produced by the RTA showed that the (traffic) diversion at $2 (in 1999 dollars) would be 26.8%, $3 – 36.8%, and extrapolated in a linear fashion to $5 – 56.8%. This information can be gleaned from the original EIS in tables 8.25 and 8.26. It is highly likely that diversion would rise larger than this due to the exponential function.

Mr Willoughby is correct in stating that large numbers of the present weekday traffic of 90,000 along Epping Road would be prepared to use the tunnel but what he fails to add is that at least 51,000 would not. Due to the brazen plan to effectively close Epping Road, a major piece of road infrastructure for Sydney, there will be 51,000 vehicles per weekday spewing into other major roads in the area and beyond. The Lane Cove Tunnel as precisely planned will seriously compromise traffic flow, road amenity and the quality of life in the area. One can only guess why the RTA should actively pursue such perverse aims, instead of aiming for optimal transport and flow efficiency. The RTA has a clear duty to answer the following:
1) What is the cost of the tunnel;
2) What is the toll necessary at that cost; and
3) What is the diversion without closing Epping Road of that toll.

The RTA currently lies on these matters and they know they lie. Only when these answers are given can there be a proper and informed discussion instead of the public of the North Shore being treated like mushrooms.

R.J.Tanner
West Chatswood"




Action for Public Transport home page

Twitter Facebook webcounter