North–South Corridor, Adelaide
| North–South Corridor South Australia | |
|---|---|
 | |
| South Road Underpass beneath Anzac Highway | |
| General information | |
| Type | Road |
| Length | 107 km (66 mi) |
| Route number(s) |
 |
| Major junctions | |
| South end |
 |
| North end |
 |
| Location(s) | |
| Major suburbs | Bedford Park, Black Forest, Glandore, Angle Park, Globe Derby Park, Bolivar, Waterloo Corner, Virginia, Penfield, Andrews Farm, Angle Vale, Gawler |
The North–South Corridor is a series of road projects currently under construction or planning which travel through Adelaide, South Australia that will eventually form a continuous link from Old Noarlunga in the outer southern metropolitan Adelaide suburbs through to Nuriootpa in the inner northern rural area around the Barossa Valley, a distance of over 100 km, aiming to be without a single stop by 2030.
The route comprises a number of major road links in the metropolitan area, including, from north to south, the Northern Expressway, the under construction Northern Connector and North–South Motorway, and the Southern Expressway.
Road links
By 2030, all of these major road links are proposed to have been completed, thus making a major route through the Adelaide metropolitan area a much more efficient way to travel. Its expected to take only one hour to travel from Noarlunga in the South to Gawler in the North.
The government has a strategy to deliver the complete project in ten years from May 2015.[1] The components identified by the Department of Planning, Transport and Infrastructure are:[2]
| Road | Status | Opened | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Northern Expressway | Complete | 13 September 2010 | |
| Northern Connector | Under construction | planned December 2019 | |
| North–South Motorway |
South Road Superway | Complete | 13 March 2014 |
| Regency Road to Pym Street | Funded | planned 2022 | |
| Torrens Road to River Torrens | Complete | 29 September 2018 | |
| River Torrens to Anzac Highway | Unfunded | ||
| Anzac Highway to Darlington | Unfunded | ||
| Darlington Interchange | Under construction | planned 2019 | |
| Southern Expressway | Complete | 17 December 1997 | |
Sturt Highway
The Sturt Highway continues the north–south motor traffic corridor to Nuriootpa as a dual carriageway road with the second carriageway added between 2007 and 2009, providing a total of two lanes in each direction. The Sturt Highway continues beyond Nuriootpa as just one lane each way. The next major bottleneck is the town of Truro which has the highway as its main street. A bypass is proposed in 5 to 15 years from the 2015 integrated plan.[3]
Northern Expressway
The Northern Expressway opened in September 2010 and was subsequently named the Max Fatchen Expressway, as the longest new road project in South Australia for a number of decades. Max Fatchen was a popular author and journalist who had grown up and lived most of his life in the area traversed by the expressway. The 4 lane highway extends from Port Wakefield Road, northwest through 5 interchanges in Penfield (2 interchanges), Andrews Farm, Angle Vale and Gawler River to where it joins the Sturt Highway just outside Gawler.
Cycling is prohibited on the expressway. The Stuart O'Grady Bikeway was constructed in conjunction with the expressway and follows the southeastern side of it.
Northern Connector
The Northern Connector is another under construction link in the North–South Corridor. It will join to the interchange in Dry Creek with the South Road Superway, Salisbury Highway and Port River Expressway. This interchange will be completely free flowing for all directions, keeping with the free-flowing plan of South Road. The connector will be an alternate route to Port Wakefield Road and the Northern Expressway, without the traffic light intersections of Port Wakefield Road. It will have interchanges in the suburbs Bolivar and Waterloo Corner, and connect to the Northern Expressway in Virginia.[4]
North–South Motorway
The North–South Motorway is an incomplete planned motorway traversing the inner western suburbs of Adelaide from Wingfield in the north to Bedford Park in the south. It is planned to be a non-stop north–south route overlaying the same motor traffic corridor as South Road by grade separation connecting the Northern Expressway and Southern Expressway.
For the purposes of construction planning, the motorway is divided into five sections, three of which are unconstructed or incomplete. From north to south are the South Road Superway which is complete, Regency Road to Pym Street Project which is funded with preparatory work under way (expected completion 2022), the T2T lowered motorway (Torrens Road to River Torrens Project) which was completed late in 2018, the River Torrens to Anzac Highway which is not started but has traffic problems mitigated by the Gallipoli Underpass, and Anzac Highway to Darlington which is not started but has traffic problems mitigated by the Glenelg Tram Overpass (2009), Emerson Crossing (1985) and the in-progress Darlington Upgrade Project.
Southern Expressway
The Southern Expressway opened in two stages in 1997 and 2001 respectively, as a one way freeway which was closed for an hour twice a day, and reversed direction to match peak traffic flow; open northwards (towards city) weekday mornings and weekend afternoons, and open southwards (away from city) weekday afternoons and weekend mornings. Duplication of the Expressway began in 2011, with the construction of a second carriageway allowing the expressway to operate in both directions at all hours. The duplication opened on 3 August 2014.[5]
The Southern Expressway southern end is at Main South Road, Old Noarlunga. Northbound has free-flowing entry onto the roadway, whereas southbound travellers have a set of traffic lights to exit the expressway. Heading south after the expressway, Victor Harbor can be accessed with 1 additional set of traffic lights, and Cape Jervis is only 3 more sets of lights.
The expressway terminates in the north at Main South Road in Bedford Park, where for both northbound (off expressway) and southbound (onto expressway), this is controlled by traffic lights. The duplication kept this location controlled by lights, but there is construction underway for a Darlington Interchange (see below), which will remove these traffic lights.
See also
References
- ↑ "North–South Corridor The 10 year Strategy" (PDF). Department of Planning, Transport and Infrastructure. May 2015. K-Net #9526649, V1. Retrieved 6 April 2016.
- ↑ "Adelaide's North-South Corridor". Department of Planning, Transport and Infrastructure South Australia. Retrieved 12 December 2015.
- ↑ "The Integrated Transport and Land Use Plan" (PDF). Government of South Australia. July 2015. p. 149. Retrieved 30 April 2018.
- ↑ "Northern Connector Project". Government of South Australia, Department of Planning, Transport and Infrastructure. Retrieved 25 September 2015.
- ↑ "Southern Expressway Duplication". Department of Planning, Transport and Infrastructure. Retrieved 1 September 2014.
- Department of Planning, Transport and Infrastructure (19 September 2012). "Adelaide's north-south corridor". Government of South Australia. Retrieved 28 December 2013.
