POTHOLES and deteriorated roads are set to get worse, according to the State Member for Shepparton District Kim O’Keeffe, who said the debt-ridden State Government has slashed resurfacing and rehabilitation works to a third of what was being fixed three years ago.
Data released in performance reports linked to the May budget reveal the shockingly low amount of rehabilitation work that will be carried out across regional Victoria. The damning figures show resurfacing works for the next 12 months have plummeted by more than 65 per cent on regional roads.
Ms O’Keeffe, said this figure shouldn’t be surprising considering the current disgraceful condition of our roads. She said, “Our roads are crumbling, and dangerous potholes and uneven, broken road surfaces are putting lives at risk.”
Justin Bartlet, managing director of VSA Roads, regional Victoria’s largest bitumen provider, said the underspend was resulting in the state’s roads deteriorating at an alarming rate.
“There’s a life cycle of bitumen, and after 10 years it becomes aged and brittle and starts to crack, and if you’re not resurfacing, water gets in,” he said.
Ms O’Keeffe has criticised the State Government for blaming flooding, rather than funding, for the condition of Victorian roads.
“These savage reductions in resurfacing programs will see our roads continue to deteriorate. When will this government realise it is putting lives at risk?” Ms O’Keeffe said.
“These cutbacks will eventually catch up and result in an exponential spend in the future.
“The Government has their priorities all wrong by investing in billion-dollar cost blowouts on city-centric projects, such as the Suburban Rail Loop, at the expense of fixing our regional roads.
“I urge the Minister for Roads and Road Safety, Melissa Horne, to come out to regional Victoria and have a look at our unsafe roads.
A Victorian Government spokesperson said that above-average rainfall and what was previously considered “once-in-a-generation flood” are now commonplace, causing unprecedented road damage. The spokesperson said that in response, recent maintenance programs have been focussed on rebuilding and strengthening hundreds of roads damaged by floods and extreme rainfall.
“It would be disingenuous of Kim O’Keeffe and the Liberal National Party to ignore the unprecedented damage repeated flooding and above-average rainfall has caused to our roads,” the spokesperson said. “Simply resurfacing these roads is not enough to repair them completely – they need to be rebuilt from the ground up to avoid further degradation.
“Now works to completely rebuild our most flood-damaged roads is complete, resurfacing levels will significantly increase during the upcoming maintenance season – this will include roads across Shepparton,” they said.
“We’ll continue this important work investing $964 million into maintaining our roads in this year alone – far exceeding the yearly average of $493 million under the previous Liberal National Government.”
Maintenance experts from the Department of Transport and Planning are now finalising a program of works for the upcoming maintenance season, utilising the Victorian Budget 24/25 investment of more than $964M towards maintaining Victoria’s road assets.
The State Government is investing $6.6B into the maintenance of road assets over 10 years, as part of a multi-year funding approach which means we can plan long-term and deliver works strategically across the state.
