The Member for Lingiari, Warren Snowdon and the Member for Stuart, Karl Hampton, officially opened a major upgrade of the Victoria Highway today that will help prevent the national road link being closed during wet season flooding.

Mr Snowdon said the Australian Government funded a $50 million upgrade, which has seen the completion of the Victoria River Bridge, and crossings over Joe, Lost and Sandy Creeks as part of the Accelerated Victoria Highway Upgrade package.

Mr Snowdon said the Victoria Highway is a key link in the Perth to Darwin corridor for tourism, defence, mining, cattle and transport industries.

“This project delivered four new higher level bridges and raised 7.5 kilometres of road to make the highway more reliable in the wet season.

“Historically these sections of the road have closed every wet season for on average five days due to flooding, and extreme rainfalls causing the road to close for weeks at a time.

“Now average closure times will be reduced to less than eight hours rather than weeks during extreme rainfall events,” Mr Snowdon said.

The new Victoria River Bridge, located about 200 kilometres south west of Katherine, is 7.5 metres higher and twice the length of the old bridge nearby, and incorporates a pedestrian walkway.

The $50m Victoria Highway Upgrade package includes:

Raising the Victoria Highway Bridge by 7.5 metres
Replacing the Joe Creek Culvert with a new higher level bridge
Raising the Lost Creek Bridge by 7.5 metres
Replacing the Sandy Creek Bridge
Improving the Flood immunity of two low lying sections on the floodplain via major embankment works
A total of 7.5 kilometres of major roadworks

Related files:
Hampton.161209.bridge.pdf ( 32.3 kb )