Transport options push

By Ed Merrison
KNOX councillors are stepping up the pressure on the State Government to look at the bigger transport picture.
Councillors last week turned a VicRoads arterial road funding application into an opportunity to push for public transport improvements.
Tirhatuan Ward councillor Mick Van de Vreede said the Government should allow councils to submit an integrated transport wish list rather than looking at roads in isolation.
This would mean projects such as the Knox tram extension and Rowville rail line would be weighed up against road improvements.
“Over the next 15 to 20 years we could waste money building things that don’t have a future,” Cr Van de Vreede said.
The council voted to submit its road priority list, but also to advocate for a change in the process after Ian Bell, council director of engineering and infrastructure, advised that the amendment should not jeopardise the funding application.
Number one on the road priority list is a two-kilometre four-lane extension of Dorset Road from Burwood Highway to Napoleon Road.
Dobson Ward councillor Karin Orpen has been campaigning for the extension for years.
She said the it would provide a bypass of Ferntree Gully, relieving congestion and delays on Glenfern Road and Brenock Park Drive and improving safety for pedestrians and vehicles.
Cr Orpen said the State Government had been sitting on land for the extension for decades and its inaction was denying title holders an opportunity to move on with their lives.
“If the Government’s not prepared to build the road, it should sell the land it’s holding,” she said.
“It’s time to put up or shut up.”