I have just returned from a trip from NE Victoria to Sydney and then back through Bathurst, Cowra and Wagga Wagga region. The roads have always been deteriorating in Regional areas throughout Australia but the roads I have just travelled will need to be completely replaced not patched up like they have been doing for years now. I would avoid these roads for the not too distant future. They would surely not have enough "signs" warning of a rough road ahead as there is simply too many. I saw 2 cars pulled over on the side of the road with obvious wheel under carriage damage. Some of the potholes are very deep and cannot be avoided if a vehicle is coming the other way. The Hume highway is also deteriorating in some areas due to ongoing neglect. But I have NEVER seen the roads so bad in all my years of travel. They have been neglected for years and the recent floods have now compounded the problem. So to governments of ALL States .... you need to allocate a % of your annual budget to Regional roads. As I said the roads just travelled are now beyond just patching up. They need to be replaced completely and their are so many of them that it is going to cost Billions. Avoid these roads at the moment. I consider them outright DANGEROUS.
Dougwe said
07:24 AM Dec 3, 2022
Morning Col,
I too have traveled from N E Vic to Junee via Olympic Hwy 4 weeks ago then back same way 2 weeks ago and it was like snakes and ladders avoiding potholes etc. In fact, I would call some craters. I reckon the section on the north side just on the edge of Culcairn is probably the worst. Real extra slow down stuff. They might leave it like that to make sure everyone has to go through town slowly.
How's the water level around Wagga now mate. When was going up, I couldn't believe the amount of water around the edges of town. North Wagga was closed off even.
Keep safe mate.
Mike Harding said
08:20 AM Dec 3, 2022
Agreed Col.
Yesterday I drove into Ararat, about 70km, and frequently had to avoid large potholes but the worst was at the bottom of a dip where a complete section of the bitumen about 1m wide and the entire width of the road was missing leaving a hole which needed to be traversed at walking pace, God knows what it would do to a small car hitting it at 100kph perhaps in the dark.
cjt55 said
09:01 AM Dec 3, 2022
Hi Doug,
I and many others travelling around me got off the Olympic Highway and took the shortest route to the Hume Highway and came out just North of Gundagai. The road was simply too bad. All the flood waters from Bathurst through down to Cootamundra etc had mainly subsided but you could see how high the water was. But the roads throughout regional Australia have been neglected for decades. Always just patched up time and time again. The heavy rain may have just done us all a favour as most of these roads will need to be completely replaced ..... but I won't hold my breath. Regional areas have been neglected for far too long.
-- Edited by cjt55 on Saturday 3rd of December 2022 10:16:52 AM
Ivan 01 said
01:48 PM Dec 3, 2022
Never fear Aussie motorists, the taxes from the newly introduced electric vehicles will pay for new highway networks all over this great land.
No! No! Wait a minute, the taxes from the ever increasing fuel prices will pay for new highway networks.
Or will the consumer use of the fossil fuels that are supposed to pay for our roads drop to such a low level that there may not be enough revenue from taxes to cover the cost of thousands of kilometres of potholes. Surely using renewable energy that we are all told is free wont be taxed. Will it??
We will all have to listen very carefully to the excuses offered in the next year or so.
PeterD said
02:34 PM Dec 3, 2022
Ivan 01 wrote:
No! No! Wait a minute, the taxes from the ever increasing fuel prices will pay for new highway networks.
Fuel tax is not a percentage of the fuel price. It is a fixed price per litre. Fuel tax revenue will be going down as people can not afford to travel as far because of the increased fuel prices.
It is statements like yours that generate fake news.
Plain Truth said
03:12 PM Dec 3, 2022
Fuel excise is a flat sales tax,46 cents a litre of fuel.
But it is not the only tax,there is still GST at 10% no matter what the price per litre is.
-- Edited by Plain Truth on Saturday 3rd of December 2022 03:14:25 PM
Ivan 01 said
03:22 PM Dec 3, 2022
PeterD wrote:
Ivan 01 wrote:
No! No! Wait a minute, the taxes from the ever increasing fuel prices will pay for new highway networks.
Fuel tax is not a percentage of the fuel price. It is a fixed price per litre. Fuel tax revenue will be going down as people can not afford to travel as far because of the increased fuel prices.
It is statements like yours that generate fake news.
I appreciate your comment and I must agree to that part as an EXCISE (not tax) you are absolutely correct.
Apart from the excise being lowered be it almost non transparent for a time and then raised again to the benefit of no one but the oil companies and their retailers, a litre of fuel in our country at this moment attracts a TAX and this tax is called the GST.
These taxes and excises as I believe, all end up in general revenue so that any government can use the money which was originally allocated to road building and maintenance, to any reason they see fit.
Well, if my statement above is fake then feel welcome to highlight the part that is not true.
Mistakenly calling the set EXCISE a tax is a common mistake. In this country we pay double tax on many items when there is an excise applied. Beer comes to mind as well but that can be * fake news* or indeed *fact*, for another day.
Why do you think the ACCC does not give a rats handbag how high the price of fuel goes. For those that dont grasp this concept we currently pay about $0.46 per litre excise on fuel for onroad use. On top of this we pay 10% of the retail price as GST.
Lets say diesel is currently $2.40 cpl so included in that price we pay another $0.24 cpl on top of the fixed excise. This amounts to approx $0.70cents per litre.
My original post above PeterD, of which you took a snippet, was basically spoken with tongue in cheek. Taking one sentence and suggesting it may indicate that I am attempting to create fake news is, to put it bluntly, fake news.
The topic is about the damage to roads which believe me is not only restricted to VIC and NSW and my post is but a query as to how we (being us motorists) are going to foot this bill in the future. Nothing to do with fake news.
My opinion that in this country us motorists are being *screwed* every day by govts of any persuasion and this has been happening since the very day the taxes and or excises collected on the sale of fuel for on road building and maintenance, have been directed to other areas of expenditure.
A country as big as Australia with the reliance on a good road network should actually have a good road network.
-- Edited by Ivan 01 on Saturday 3rd of December 2022 03:23:26 PM
Ivan 01 said
04:01 PM Dec 3, 2022
Just to continue on how well our money is being spent on road construction for those with subscriptions to the courier mail or the Whitsunday times google the story of the bridge at the Bowen River being completely washed away 10 days after its opening.
Then google the comments of the local member for the Whitsundays ( Willcox I think is his name) regarding the two companies that were appointed the contracts for reconstruction of sections of the Bruce Highway between Proserpine and Bowen. There are sections of this road that have been in total disrepair for going on 12 months due to the awarded contractors not being able to fulfil their contractual obligations.
These highway fundings come from both Fed and State coffers and those coffers are filled with our taxes.
For the comments in the first few posts, dont expect anything but a Band-Aid fix to any road that new work wont directly affect an election result.
The very day that the Bowen River bridge went down the creek so to speak the state govt was announcing the construction of a *new* Bruce Highway in the SE of the state and near Brisbane.
Until the roads are funded in a professional and sustainable manner there will be no joy in travelling on country roads and no value with many contracts that appear to be substandard in quality from the get go. In the end it comes down to price.
A cheap road is a substandard road or in the case around Bowen a road that fails completely and is a waste of money.
I cant access the news article because I refuse to pay for any media but here is a picture sent to me.
-- Edited by Ivan 01 on Saturday 3rd of December 2022 04:04:16 PM
-- Edited by Ivan 01 on Saturday 3rd of December 2022 04:10:52 PM
Your right there Ivan, Facebook free, media you have to pay. Local rag here even during the height of the recent flood, they only made certain stories free to read , if they thought someone might be in danger. My thought was everyone was in possible danger so why not make it free to all, that's right, read it for free and then no one buys the local rag, got it in one
Southern Cruizer said
03:03 PM Dec 12, 2022
Dougwe wrote:
Morning Col,
I too have traveled from N E Vic to Junee via Olympic Hwy 4 weeks ago then back same way 2 weeks ago and it was like snakes and ladders avoiding potholes etc. In fact, I would call some craters. I reckon the section on the north side just on the edge of Culcairn is probably the worst. Real extra slow down stuff. They might leave it like that to make sure everyone has to go through town slowly.
How's the water level around Wagga now mate. When was going up, I couldn't believe the amount of water around the edges of town. North Wagga was closed off even.
Keep safe mate.
Doug the Junee end of the back road to Wagga from Junee is half done. By that I mean Junee shire has ripped their end up, fixed it and resealed it. A race track by far but as soon as you hit the Wagga City Council half of the road, hang on, hold on tight and pretend your drunk to swerve and miss all the holes. They put a few stones and tar in some but must have run out and haven't come back to finish it. Some of the pot holes I would imagine hitting them at speed in a small car is going to do a little bit of damage. Some people just don't slow down at all, in fact on these back roads they give it just a little bit extra to beat everyone to wherever they are going. Do damage then jump on social media to complain about the councils not doing the roadwork.
cjt55 said
07:17 AM Jan 3, 2023
Revisiting my original post I see on the news today that the NSW government has just allocated extra $500,000.00 for the repair of regional roads and they specifically mention the areas I mentioned. That is great news to begin with but they are so bad that they need to be looking at a long term full rebuild programme. As I suggested they need a long term fix and I suggest they allocate a % of their annual budget specifically to fix the regional roads. Not just NSW but all the other states and territories need to do the same. Just patching them up year after year is not the answer. I will add though that WA regional roads are generally very good. Well done WA.
-- Edited by cjt55 on Tuesday 3rd of January 2023 08:38:43 AM
Kebbin said
09:11 AM Jan 3, 2023
NSW Government are offering $500,000 grants to Regional Councils, not $500,000 all up for regional roads. Relying on Facebook to keep informed is like relying on Politicians to tell the truth.
Cuppa said
09:37 AM Jan 3, 2023
The worst floods in living memory damage many roads, creating dangerous driving conditions.
Not a good situation for anyone needing to travel.
Issues of safety to pass on to to fellow travellers & somewhere to vent about the experience of driving in what have become dangerous roads seems a reasonable topic on a forum for travellers.
Using the thread as a platform for a finger pointing personal political hobbyhorse adds nothing useful for anyone.
Ivan 01 said
09:53 AM Jan 3, 2023
Cuppa wrote:
The worst floods in living memory damage many roads, creating dangerous driving conditions.
Not a good situation for anyone needing to travel.
Issues of safety to pass on to to fellow travellers & somewhere to vent about the experience of driving in what have become dangerous roads seems a reasonable topic on a forum for travellers.
Using the thread as a platform for a finger pointing personal political hobbyhorse adds nothing useful for anyone.
Reading over this topic 3 or 4 times and I can not see any political finger pointing. NSW VIC and Qld govts are responsible for their own roads.
How they manage R and M on them is up to them.
My tongue in cheek comment on where we will get the money to fix these roads is just that, however after reading the topic again maybe there actually is a true word spoken in jest.
Possum3 said
10:25 AM Jan 3, 2023
Other than recent flood damage most damage to main roads comes from heavy vehicles. It's about time a serious look into the future of Australia's future transportation infrastructure is undertaken by Governments with an eye to best solution rather than election prospects.
Topics that come to mind are;
a. Rail for goods transportation.
b. Sea ferries have a potential for coastal cities trading.
c. Fuel shortages with removal of fossil fuels.
d. Lack of funding for roads - No petrol/diesel means no fuel excise.
e. Heavy electric vehicles being more prone to damage on bad roads.
f. Lack of Superannuation Funds as current bunch of "old farts" fall off the twig - Millennials unable to live within their meagre incomes.
Craig1 said
11:52 AM Jan 3, 2023
." Lack of funding for roads - No petrol/diesel means no fuel excise " wrote Possum the 16th
Victoria have announced that they will charge E V s an increased amount per km travelled, do not know how they do it though. No annual inspections there, maybe rely on an " honesty system "
I have just returned from a trip from NE Victoria to Sydney and then back through Bathurst, Cowra and Wagga Wagga region. The roads have always been deteriorating in Regional areas throughout Australia but the roads I have just travelled will need to be completely replaced not patched up like they have been doing for years now. I would avoid these roads for the not too distant future. They would surely not have enough "signs" warning of a rough road ahead as there is simply too many. I saw 2 cars pulled over on the side of the road with obvious wheel under carriage damage. Some of the potholes are very deep and cannot be avoided if a vehicle is coming the other way. The Hume highway is also deteriorating in some areas due to ongoing neglect. But I have NEVER seen the roads so bad in all my years of travel. They have been neglected for years and the recent floods have now compounded the problem. So to governments of ALL States .... you need to allocate a % of your annual budget to Regional roads. As I said the roads just travelled are now beyond just patching up. They need to be replaced completely and their are so many of them that it is going to cost Billions. Avoid these roads at the moment. I consider them outright DANGEROUS.
I too have traveled from N E Vic to Junee via Olympic Hwy 4 weeks ago then back same way 2 weeks ago and it was like snakes and ladders avoiding potholes etc. In fact, I would call some craters. I reckon the section on the north side just on the edge of Culcairn is probably the worst. Real extra slow down stuff. They might leave it like that to make sure everyone has to go through town slowly.
How's the water level around Wagga now mate. When was going up, I couldn't believe the amount of water around the edges of town. North Wagga was closed off even.
Keep safe mate.
Agreed Col.
Yesterday I drove into Ararat, about 70km, and frequently had to avoid large potholes but the worst was at the bottom of a dip where a complete section of the bitumen about 1m wide and the entire width of the road was missing leaving a hole which needed to be traversed at walking pace, God knows what it would do to a small car hitting it at 100kph perhaps in the dark.
Hi Doug,
I and many others travelling around me got off the Olympic Highway and took the shortest route to the Hume Highway and came out just North of Gundagai. The road was simply too bad. All the flood waters from Bathurst through down to Cootamundra etc had mainly subsided but you could see how high the water was. But the roads throughout regional Australia have been neglected for decades. Always just patched up time and time again. The heavy rain may have just done us all a favour as most of these roads will need to be completely replaced ..... but I won't hold my breath. Regional areas have been neglected for far too long.
-- Edited by cjt55 on Saturday 3rd of December 2022 10:16:52 AM
No! No! Wait a minute, the taxes from the ever increasing fuel prices will pay for new highway networks.
Or will the consumer use of the fossil fuels that are supposed to pay for our roads drop to such a low level that there may not be enough revenue from taxes to cover the cost of thousands of kilometres of potholes. Surely using renewable energy that we are all told is free wont be taxed. Will it??
We will all have to listen very carefully to the excuses offered in the next year or so.
Fuel tax is not a percentage of the fuel price. It is a fixed price per litre. Fuel tax revenue will be going down as people can not afford to travel as far because of the increased fuel prices.
It is statements like yours that generate fake news.
Fuel excise is a flat sales tax,46 cents a litre of fuel.
But it is not the only tax,there is still GST at 10% no matter what the price per litre is.
-- Edited by Plain Truth on Saturday 3rd of December 2022 03:14:25 PM
I appreciate your comment and I must agree to that part as an EXCISE (not tax) you are absolutely correct.
Apart from the excise being lowered be it almost non transparent for a time and then raised again to the benefit of no one but the oil companies and their retailers, a litre of fuel in our country at this moment attracts a TAX and this tax is called the GST.
These taxes and excises as I believe, all end up in general revenue so that any government can use the money which was originally allocated to road building and maintenance, to any reason they see fit.
Well, if my statement above is fake then feel welcome to highlight the part that is not true.
Mistakenly calling the set EXCISE a tax is a common mistake.
In this country we pay double tax on many items when there is an excise applied. Beer comes to mind as well but that can be * fake news* or indeed *fact*, for another day.
Why do you think the ACCC does not give a rats handbag how high the price of fuel goes.
For those that dont grasp this concept we currently pay about $0.46 per litre excise on fuel for onroad use. On top of this we pay 10% of the retail price as GST.
Lets say diesel is currently $2.40 cpl so included in that price we pay another $0.24 cpl on top of the fixed excise. This amounts to approx $0.70cents per litre.
My original post above PeterD, of which you took a snippet, was basically spoken with tongue in cheek. Taking one sentence and suggesting it may indicate that I am attempting to create fake news is, to put it bluntly, fake news.
The topic is about the damage to roads which believe me is not only restricted to VIC and NSW and my post is but a query as to how we (being us motorists) are going to foot this bill in the future. Nothing to do with fake news.
My opinion that in this country us motorists are being *screwed* every day by govts of any persuasion and this has been happening since the very day the taxes and or excises collected on the sale of fuel for on road building and maintenance, have been directed to other areas of expenditure.
A country as big as Australia with the reliance on a good road network should actually have a good road network.
-- Edited by Ivan 01 on Saturday 3rd of December 2022 03:23:26 PM
Just to continue on how well our money is being spent on road construction for those with subscriptions to the courier mail or the Whitsunday times google the story of the bridge at the Bowen River being completely washed away 10 days after its opening.
Then google the comments of the local member for the Whitsundays ( Willcox I think is his name) regarding the two companies that were appointed the contracts for reconstruction of sections of the Bruce Highway between Proserpine and Bowen. There are sections of this road that have been in total disrepair for going on 12 months due to the awarded contractors not being able to fulfil their contractual obligations.
These highway fundings come from both Fed and State coffers and those coffers are filled with our taxes.
For the comments in the first few posts, dont expect anything but a Band-Aid fix to any road that new work wont directly affect an election result.
The very day that the Bowen River bridge went down the creek so to speak the state govt was announcing the construction of a *new* Bruce Highway in the SE of the state and near Brisbane.
Until the roads are funded in a professional and sustainable manner there will be no joy in travelling on country roads and no value with many contracts that appear to be substandard in quality from the get go. In the end it comes down to price.
A cheap road is a substandard road or in the case around Bowen a road that fails completely and is a waste of money.
I cant access the news article because I refuse to pay for any media but here is a picture sent to me.
-- Edited by Ivan 01 on Saturday 3rd of December 2022 04:04:16 PM
-- Edited by Ivan 01 on Saturday 3rd of December 2022 04:10:52 PM
Some more pics of the Bowen River bridge. From Facebook.
Apparently we can read it on FB but not from any news media unless we pay.
Doug the Junee end of the back road to Wagga from Junee is half done. By that I mean Junee shire has ripped their end up, fixed it and resealed it. A race track by far but as soon as you hit the Wagga City Council half of the road, hang on, hold on tight and pretend your drunk to swerve and miss all the holes. They put a few stones and tar in some but must have run out and haven't come back to finish it. Some of the pot holes I would imagine hitting them at speed in a small car is going to do a little bit of damage. Some people just don't slow down at all, in fact on these back roads they give it just a little bit extra to beat everyone to wherever they are going. Do damage then jump on social media to complain about the councils not doing the roadwork.
Revisiting my original post I see on the news today that the NSW government has just allocated extra $500,000.00 for the repair of regional roads and they specifically mention the areas I mentioned. That is great news to begin with but they are so bad that they need to be looking at a long term full rebuild programme. As I suggested they need a long term fix and I suggest they allocate a % of their annual budget specifically to fix the regional roads. Not just NSW but all the other states and territories need to do the same. Just patching them up year after year is not the answer. I will add though that WA regional roads are generally very good. Well done WA.
-- Edited by cjt55 on Tuesday 3rd of January 2023 08:38:43 AM
The worst floods in living memory damage many roads, creating dangerous driving conditions.
Not a good situation for anyone needing to travel.
Issues of safety to pass on to to fellow travellers & somewhere to vent about the experience of driving in what have become dangerous roads seems a reasonable topic on a forum for travellers.
Using the thread as a platform for a finger pointing personal political hobbyhorse adds nothing useful for anyone.
Reading over this topic 3 or 4 times and I can not see any political finger pointing. NSW VIC and Qld govts are responsible for their own roads.
How they manage R and M on them is up to them.
My tongue in cheek comment on where we will get the money to fix these roads is just that, however after reading the topic again maybe there actually is a true word spoken in jest.
Topics that come to mind are;
a. Rail for goods transportation.
b. Sea ferries have a potential for coastal cities trading.
c. Fuel shortages with removal of fossil fuels.
d. Lack of funding for roads - No petrol/diesel means no fuel excise.
e. Heavy electric vehicles being more prone to damage on bad roads.
f. Lack of Superannuation Funds as current bunch of "old farts" fall off the twig - Millennials unable to live within their meagre incomes.
Victoria have announced that they will charge E V s an increased amount per km travelled, do not know how they do it though. No annual inspections there, maybe rely on an " honesty system "