Work is about to begin on 400km worth of road safety upgrades in regional South Australia funded under various federal and state government programs.
Most of the 15 separate projects have been fast-tracked under the recently announced $104.6 million first tranche of the Road Safety Program for South Australia, which is jointly funded by the Federal and South Australian Governments on an 80:20 basis.
In addition to the Road Safety Program works, new works totalling $62.5 million are being delivered on the Barrier Highway as part of the Roads of Strategic Importance (ROSI) initiative aimed at improving access requirements for higher productivity vehicles.
The works that started this month with funding assistance from the Road Safety Program and the Regional Road Network Package include:
- Yorke Peninsula improvements (Spencer Highway/Yorke Highway and Minlaton Road /Maitland Road – 79km combined of shoulder sealing, pavement rehabilitation, audio-tactile line marking; Upper Yorke Road – 14km combined of shoulder sealing, lane widening, audio-tactile line marking, and resurfacing works; Copper Coast Highway – 8km combined of essential road resurfacing and asphalt rehabilitation.
- Eyre Highway: 65km of shoulder sealing, lane widening, and guidepost installation
- Tod Highway: 44km of shoulder sealing, lane widening, and guidepost installation.
- Birdseye Highway: 40km of shoulder sealing, lane widening, and guidepost installation
- Stuart Highway: 40km of road rehabilitation and resurfacing works.
- Ngarkat Highway: 21km of pavement widening, shoulder sealing and resurfacing works. (This project forms part of the South Australian government’s commitment to raising the speed limit on eight country roads, jointly funded (80:20) by the Federal and South Australian governments as part of the Rural Roads Safety Package.
- Horrocks Highway: 20km (over two separate projects) of shoulder sealing and/or pavement rehabilitation.
- Karoonda Highway: 16 lane kilometres of micro-surfacing to fill wheel ruts on the road surface.
- Barrier Highway: 14.5km combined of road widening and shoulder sealing along the approaches of Mount Bryan and Hallett.
- Playford Highway: culvert extensions and shoulder widening.
In addition to these works, 51km of resealing works are starting on Browns Well Highway.
Sealing works are also starting on a 20km section of Kempe Road directly north-east of Coober Pedy, as part of a project to deliver 37km of improvements that began in March 2021
The project is jointly funded by the Australian and South Australian governments via the Asset Improvement – Rural and Remote Program and the Local Roads and Community Infrastructure Program.