Roads Minister Duncan Gay’s comment that he has a ‘gut feeling’ that a study on Singleton’s traffic would reveal there’s a traffic problem, is so spot on he should be suffering severe indigestion.
Anyone who drives on the district’s road network during peak hours has more than a gut feeling. They know we have a serious problem now because they are experiencing it every single day.
And yes, Mr Gay, it will get worse.
The Hunter Expressway is due for completion next year. Two lanes of expressway traffic will form into one lane and at that point, the proverbial bottleneck will occur.
While ever there is only a one lane each way bridge over the Hunter River at Singleton the town will have a bottleneck and suffer serious traffic delays as a result.
Everyone is aware of mining expansion plans for the Hunter Valley and they are only going to add to existing traffic issues because more people will be travelling on local roads to get to work.
Traffic at a standstill is frustrating but when people can’t get to work to mine that glorious black gold all hell will break loose.
That’s this newspaper’s gut feeling.
