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The Transapex program is the biggest urban road project in Australia, according to Invest Brisbane, made up of five key projects and just a few years into its 10-year pipeline.
On the go right now is the six-lane Gateway toll bridge duplication at a cost of more than $2billion and due for completion in mid-2011.
Then there is the Hale Street Link bridge and road system that crosses the Brisbane River from Milton to West End at $2.4billion, due in late 2010. The biggest project of them all is Airport Link that will produce huge access benefits for BrisbaneAirport and the Australia TradeCoast region which is also gaining from a 230ha Port of Brisbane reclamation at $4.8billion. The Northern Link road system will be completed in 2014 at a cost of about $3.7billion.
There is also a range of local rail and busway upgrades steadily coming on stream, while the project that headlined the current era of transport infrastructure, the 1.5km North South Bypass Tunnel beneath the Story Bridge – now named CLEM 7 in honour of former Brisbane Lord Mayor Clem Jones – is due for completion this year at a cost of $4.2billion. The total 6.8km CLEM7 route will connect Woolloongabba in the south to Bowen Hills in the north, and will be the first section of the new M7 motorway.
Yet this is far from a complete list of major infrastructure under development in the Brisbane region.
The Ipswich Motorway upgrade, for example, now incorporates a visionary road and rail development known as Safelink, which will help open up road access to Springfield and on to the new Ripley Valley developments of Ipswich City. As part of the development which links through the Centenary Highway, provision for a rail corridor is the centre piece.
And as the cover image of this edition shows, take an aerial image approaching the Brisbane CBD from any angle and you will be greeted by any number of key infrastructure developments.
The cover image looks towards the CBD from the south, showing the early stages of the Princess Alexandra Hospital's new Translational Research Institute development – the only facility of its kind in the Southern Hemisphere, which will eventually house 600-plus researchers. Behind the PA Hospital extend new arms of the elevated busway. Beyond the PA Hospital is one of Australia's most fascinating sites – the Ecosciences Precinct which is to be built within the Boggo Road Urban Village redevelopment at Dutton Park, which dramatically re-fashions what was once Queensland's most notorious prison.
To the right is the road system leading to the CLEM7 tunnel and in the distance close to the city is the construction of two key bridge crossings – the Kurilpa Bridge pedestrian and cycleway and the Hale Street Bridge for road traffic.
And beyond the CLEM7 system at South Brisbane is the beginnings of the new Children's Hospital at the Mater.
There is no slowing of major infrastructure activity in Brisbane and for the construction companies, staff, contractors and suppliers involved it could hardly come at a better time.
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