Long awaited rehabilitation works for the South Gippsland Highway at Stony Creek are scheduled to be completed by mid-2025.
The Nationals Member for Gippsland South, Danny O’Brien said the condition and subsequent speed reductions on the 2 km stretch of road between McKittericks Road and Charlton Road has been a point of contention among locals and visitors alike.
“It is great to hear that we can finally expect to see some action towards repairing this section of road so that the speed limit can be returned to normal and we can get traffic safely flowing again,” Mr O’Brien said.
“It is disappointing however that it has taken so long for works to be funded and that this is the only stretch of the Highway to be receiving serious treatment this summer.
“Anyone who has driven the South Gippsland Highway recently would be hard-pressed to choose just 2 km of road to fix.”
Mr O’Brien highlighted that multiple main roads throughout Gippsland South are in an appalling state and will only deteriorate further without sufficient investment.
“The Minister for Roads and Road Safety, Melissa Horne has also advised that just 7.6 km of the South Gippsland Highway near Meeniyan, Yarram and Foster will be included in this year’s resurfacing program.”
Mr O’Brien said we are seeing the results of successive years of cuts to the road maintenance budget under a State Labor Government that has left our roads in a dire state.
“Labor is allowing our regional roads to crumble while it wastes billions of dollars in cost over-runs on city mega-projects.
“It is so frustrating to watch-on as our arterial roads deteriorate further due to poor maintenance and road management under the Allan Labor Government.
“It is clear that Labor can’t manage money, can’t manage our roads and Gippsland road users continue to pay the price.”