A PAIR of voices cut through the static of a two-way radio while travelling along the Princes Highway between Mount Gambier and Portland.
There had been a “near miss” between a caravan and truck and the language was colourful.
They praised the small amount of roadworks, but highlighted the need for a whole lot more, including a dual carriage way from Mount Gambier to Portland.
They were critical of lengthy speed restrictions and signage “… there’s not a yellow machine in sight – not even a bloke leaning on a bloody shovel,” a seemingly older voice crackled.
“In a truck you only lose time, you never gain time.
“If you lose 10 minutes here, you can never ever make it up, so do not even try.
“Anyway, welcome to ‘suicide drive’ mate.”
There was a silence before a younger voice replied: “Is that what you call it? It’s a bit of a rattler – got a few trips up now.”
“Yeah – it’s a bloody disgrace,” was the reply.
“Just keep checking your load and do not go trying to break any records and you’ll be alright mate.”
“Okay – cheers mate. Have a good one,” the younger voice said.
The voices came from any one of a number of trucks bouncing along the bitumen that was well past its use-by date.
Most were log trucks, but some were carting hay, general freight or livestock as well as a tanker or two.
It seemed every few minutes a truck, car, motorbike or 4×4 and caravan would swerve about, dodging a heritage listed rut, pothole or a jagged scrap of cracked bitumen.
A few kilometres further the two-way static crackled again – there had been some “close calls” near Portland, along with the horror of a recent fatal truck crash around Branxholme.
A common theme was the roads and “useless” governments which subsidised windfarms and plantations, but failed on infrastructure to support them – roads, bridges and mobile phone coverage.
Little better than billy goat tracks, the roads are narrow and broken scraps of patchwork gravel and bitumen.
Like many South East roads, they were built back in the days of buckboards and drays.
Decade after decade successive city-centric governments have siphoned billions of dollars out of our Green Triangle – Western Victoria and the South East and failed to return it.
Just over an hour from Mount Gambier, the busy Port of Portland is the world’s largest exporter of hardwood woodchips.
More than a decade ago industry officials warned that by 2020, somewhere in Mount Gambier, every two minutes there would be timber traffic.
At the time, the annual freight task was one million tonnes of softwood chip and 300,000 tonnes of export log.
Now an extra one million tonnes of bluegum chips, as well as a whole lot more logs, travel from north of Millicent, Penola and Hamilton and everywhere in between, to Portland.
At least 400 trucks a day hammer along old roads, to and from the Port of Portland.
Most trucks are laden with woodchips or logs, but others include grain, mineral sands, fertiliser and livestock.
Goods coming into the port include alumina, liquid pitch and fertiliser products.
Additionally, there is cruise ships, including an unscheduled cruise ship visit last week “for medical reasons”.
Also last week, Victoria’s federal Member for Wannon Dan Tehan, announced $80m would be spent to improve the safety and efficiency of roads in south west Victoria, including the Princes Highway.
Mr Tehan is calling on the Victorian Government to match the federal funding.
The $80m funding boost also issues a challenge to Member for Barker Tony Pasin, Member for Mount Gambier Troy Bell and Member for MacKillop Nick McBride.
Dual carriage ways and proper road upgrades are desperately needed throughout the entire Green Triangle Region, not just over the border.
• Chris Oldfield can be contacted by email at christobel47@bigpond.com
