Save Willy Road

This page provides updates on the latest activities of the Save Willy Road group and lists media stories that cover the issue of trucks on Williamstown Road.

WE’RE BEING RAILROADED, 3 JUNE 2023

Sending massive road trains down Williamstown Road is just plain loco. These 36 metre-long combinations of prime mover and two long trailers are a terrible fit for a residential road. Their length from end to end is the same as the height of a 10-storey building and they struggle to make sharp turns — as proof, see this video from the Maribyrnong Truck Action Group of a 30 metre-long B-Double flattening a Give Way sign in the centre median at the top of Williamstown Road. They raise safety risks for other drivers and block intersections, adding to congestion.

Every day dozens of these monster trucks roll along the full length of Williamstown Road, despite official access maps for High Productivity Freight Vehicles showing they are not approved to operate north of Francis Street. We asked a senior Department of Transport and Planning executive whether the department, as the road manager, had approved those road trains (commonly known as A-Doubles but identified in the industry as Performance Based Standards Level 3 vehicles) to use the full length of Williamstown Road despite Level 3 maps showing no access beyond Francis Street. We asked: If permits are being issued for road trains to run on Williamstown Road, then how many — and why? If they are using the road illegally, why is there no enforcement? 

We fear that this residential road is being transformed by stealth into an approved freight route for trucks that should be using freeways and industrial routes.

The DTP executive said our questions would be answered by the Roads Minister, Melissa Horne. We’ve had no reply and we have now asked Katie Hall MP for help in unearthing the facts. We deserve better from a government that promised “Trucks off local roads” in the inner west.

SMOKE AND MIRRORS ON AIR QUALITY, 13 MARCH 2023

How long will the Andrews Government maintain the fiction that the air quality assessment in the West Gate Tunnel Environment Effects Statement (EES) “identified minimal changes to air quality for residents along Williamstown Road” once the tunnel opens and an extra 2000 trucks a day roar past our homes? That carefully crafted but clearly false claim continues to be trotted out by Infrastructure Minister Jacinta Allan and her departmental officers when responding to well-grounded fears for our neighbourhood over the impending 24/7 truck bans on other local streets.

We recently challenged the lead author of the EES report on air quality to admit the study made a deeply flawed conclusion because of two blatantly false inputs. The report vastly downplayed the projected increase in truck numbers, but worse, based its rosy air quality projections on a single set of receptors conveniently placed in the one small stretch of Williamstown Road where truck numbers will plummet (outside Officeworks at Thomas Street). The air quality gains in that short section were then assumed to apply to the entire length of Williamstown Road — sheer nonsense when truck volumes for most of this road will soar.

Read our letter here

PROMISES, PORKIES IN GOVERNMENT ‘ACTION PLAN’ ON INNER WEST AIR QUALITY, 21 OCTOBER 2022

In an eight-page brochure, the Victorian government has outlined a 17-step “action plan” to improve air quality in the inner west. While most of the strategies are commendable, the brochure contains elements of fiction from a government that continues to ignore the disaster it is unleashing on Williamstown Road.

• On Page 3: “Our vision for the inner west is to improve air quality and liveability by reducing vehicle movements through local streets”. (Except Williamstown Road, where truck numbers will double).

• On Page 3: “We’re creating freight connections for cleaner trucks …” (Where?).

• On Page 5, “Improving busy intersections,” there are apparently “measures to reduce truck noise.” (What? Where? And how does a safety upgrade at an intersection improve air quality?)

Read the report here.

without an air monitor, zero chance of a mitigation plan, 11 OCTOBER 2022

Save Willy Road has written to Transport Infrastructure Minister Jacinta Allan to tell her it is imperative that an air quality monitor station be set up in Williamstown Road now to measure current pollution levels. Although the West Gate Tunnel Project is required to “develop and implement a roadside air quality mitigation strategy … for specific locations where post-construction monitoring shows a significant deterioration of air quality as a result of the Project”, the project has no air monitor on or near Williamstown Road.

The West Gate Tunnel Project told us that six monitoring stations have been set up beside key roads to “develop a baseline of data to help the project measure any changes to local air quality once the project opens”. Absurdly, two of those stations are beside Francis Street and Somerville Road, where air quality is expected to improve when trucks are banned on those roads from 2025. In contrast, truck numbers on Williamstown Road will double — to almost 5000 trucks a day.

As we explained to the Minister:

“Without baseline readings at the northern end of Williamstown Road, it will be impossible to show any deterioration in air quality once the tunnel opens. Without that evidence, there will be no mitigation strategy for Williamstown Road, which is a clear contradiction of the recommendations of both the (Inquiry and Advisory Committee) and the Planning Minister, and a breach of the (Environmental Performance Requirements).”

Be clear about this: truck diesel emissions are deadly and cause a range of proven serious health effects. The Andrews government cannot be allowed to ignore the disaster it is unleashing on residents.

(Update, 3 June 2022: Despite a follow-up to our original letter, there has still been no response from the Minister).

willy road Protections evaporate, 9 OCTOBER 2022

The Andrews government continues to walk away from protections for Williamstown Road and the Inner West when the West Gate Tunnel opens. In a response to a list of questions from Save Willy Road and the Maribyrnong Truck Action Group, the West Gate Tunnel Project has revealed that little or no action has been taken on a range of mitigation measures recommended by both the Planning Minister at the time of his approval of the $11 billion project, and the independent panel that reviewed the project’s Environment Effects Statement (EES). 

Nor has it given any indication that it will ever implement most of those recommendations.

We sought a progress report on what action has been taken on the recommendations from the Minister and review panel —measures that were intended to protect residents where truck numbers will dramatically rise. In short, the responses to our questions on the following issues were:

AIR QUALITY: Delivery of Port Rail Shuttle Network to shift more containers from road to rail expected this year, but no action to measure air quality or develop an air quality mitigation strategy for Willy Road.

SMOKY VEHICLE ENFORCEMENT PROGRAM: No action.

NOISY VEHICLES REDUCTION POLICY: No action.

HIGHER TRUCK TRAFFIC VOLUMES: Almost three years after the termination of the Millers Road-Williamstown Road Corridor Study — established to seek measures to mitigate the projected rise in truck traffic on those two roads — its recommendations are still being “explored” and its costs weighed. The previously secret recommendations were released in 2021 only through Save Willy Road’s lengthy Freedom of Information efforts.

TRUCK BAN ENFORCEMENT: A trial of heavy vehicle monitoring cameras has begun on Somerville Road, one of several streets where trucks will be banned when the tunnel opens. A monitoring and compliance strategy is yet to be developed.

FUTURE TRUCK TRAFFIC GROWTH: No action to begin planning for a northern traffic corridor on an east-west alignment to cater for future freight traffic growth.

In summary, after ramming though its $11 billion tunnel project with a rushed (and often factually flawed) EES the Andrews Government is turning its back on the protection measures the entire EES inquiry and approval process proposed. Although the Port Rail Shuttle may eventually carry a significant level of containers to and from Altona, taking some trucks off the roads, residents and users of Williamstown Road will inevitably suffer as thousands of extra trucks, hoping to dodge high tolls, storm past our homes day and night. It’ll be a disaster for our health, safety and amenity. Though the minister who approved the project recommended a series of protections to lessen the harm, the Government has simply shrugged them off, leaving residents to suffer the cost on their own.

Read our request to the West Gate Tunnel Project for a progress report here.

Read the WGTP response here.

Read our verdict here.

Department’s BRUSH-OFF ON CORRIDOR STUDY recommendations, 19 november 2021

Hopes of any genuine outcome from the government’s sham Millers Road-Williamstown Road Corridor Study have been dashed by a dismissive response from the Department of Transport to Save Willy Road’s request for information on just what mitigation measures it is planning.

We wrote to Transport Minister Ben Carroll pointing out that in approving the West Gate Tunnel in 2017, the Planning Minister recommended the corridor study “be undertaken as early as possible to allow mitigation works to be implemented prior to the completion of the project construction”. Two of the corridor study’s recommended initiatives were for:

• Williamstown Road/Thomas Street signalisation; and

• Williamstown Road/Somerville Road fully controlled turn.

But several other initiatives recommended in the corridor study, if properly implemented, have the potential to move traffic away from Williamstown Road, reducing the impacts on our heath, safety and amenity created by the near-5000 freight trucks forecast to pass our homes daily. Those initiatives were:

• Signal optimisation to channel freight through industrial areas (though the precise nature of the plan and the level of incentive/disincentive for truck drivers is unclear);

• Improve Grieve Parade to incentivise truck use; and

• Millers Road/Geelong Road/Francis Street intersection.

We asked the Minister which of the corridor study’s final report recommendations the state government will implement, and when. We received this reply from Alan Fedda, DoT executive director, Metro North West:

“I understand your interest and concern for the safety and wellbeing of the community. As outlined in the Millers Road and Williamstown Road Corridor Study, the initiatives will be considered for future network development. The Department of Transport will continue to seek opportunities to develop these initiatives, and this will form part of our broader approach to ensure integrated and complementary transport planning responses are provided for the western Melbourne transport network. I trust that this information has assisted in answering your concerns.”

Actually, it answers nothing. Two years after the sham corridor study, which the DoT hijacked, then later lied about and did its best to keep secret, we have NO action on traffic measures to fix the nightmare the state government is creating with its 24/7 truck bans on other roads, and NO plans to change that. Those truck bans on Somerville Road, Francis Street and Buckley Street will simply divert thousands more dirty, noisy and high-polluting trucks on to Williamstown Road every day. A vague hope of one day “developing these initiatives” is yet another slap in the face for long-suffering residents. After spending $11 billion on a tunnel, the government is simply creating another Francis Street in the inner west. Right past our homes.

MESSAGE TO EMPTY CONTAINER PARKS: “YOU NEED TO GET OUT!”, 12 NOVEMBER 2021

The combination of the Port Rail Shuttle and future relocation of empty container parks from the Tottenham/Brooklyn area continue to appear our best hopes of seeing an eventual reduction in dirty diesel trucks down Williamstown Road. 

Ports and Freight Minister Melissa Horne hosted a meeting with Maribyrnong Truck Action Group and Save Willy Road on 12 November for a briefing on a new consultants’ report, ”Strategic Review of the Victorian Empty Container Supply Chain". The main takeaways of the report were that the continued demand for imports will generate a greater amount of surplus empty containers at Port of Melbourne, and that by 2030, empty containers will be the biggest export in Victoria. It reported on how transport companies are stung fees as high as $215 if they make a booking to deliver an empty container to the stevedores but miss their timeslot, and the report notes that one of the reasons for those delays is "congestion on arterial roads". 

The report noted that stakeholders see increasing use of freight on rail as "critical to improving the overall performance and efficiency of the containerised freight supply chain”. The Port Rail Shuttle, which will transport long trains of containers from the port to Altona, is scheduled to begin operation in October 2022.

Freight Victoria senior executive Andrew Newman says he continues to meet the owners of the empty container parks and says that at a recent meeting with management at a major Sunshine Rd container park where he emphasised that their direct access to the port will be cut off when the 24/7 truck bans take effect, he said they were already fretting that once that happens they will lose customers. He says his repeated message to those owners is "You need to get out." Invest Victoria is assisting those owners with information on what prospective new locations are on the market. 

Two major container parks have already accepted the grim reality. A 13ha container park at 385 Francis Street, Brooklyn, owned by Qube and leased to Malec Brothers and Chalmers Container Services changed hands in 2020 for $65 million and — as the photos here show — it has now been emptied of containers, which until recently were being hauled along Francis Street and Williamstown Road to the Port of Melbourne. Victorian Container Management is also exiting its 8000-container site at 433A Somerville Road and will move to 141 Dohertys Road, Altona North, providing direct access to the freeway. 

Melissa Horne insists the combination of Port Rail Shuttle and container park relocations will make a difference, claiming: "There will be exponential change in the next five years.”

We believe there are grounds for optimism that the Port Rail Shuttle will take container trucks off the road, and that it will lure more container parks and transport depots to move closer to Altona. But crucially, Webb Dock — which is tipped to experience huge growth in container movements — will have NO rail on dock and is unlikely to for years. And that’s the destination for most container trucks using Willy Road. The clear solution: the government must raise the pressure further on truck operators, using traffic management measures and a Low Emission Zone to send a clear signal: port trucks have no place on residential roads.

Read the report here.

CORRIDOR STUDY REPORT RELEASED, 13 OCTOBER 2021

Two years after the Millers Road-Williamstown Road Corridor Study was wound up, the Department of Transport has finally released its report on traffic measures that could help to minimise the expected onslaught of trucks on Williamstown Road after the opening of the West Gate Tunnel.

The report’s recommendations include improvements to Grieve Parade to incentivise truck use on that route and a network-wide traffic signal “optimisation” plan designed to channel freight through industrial roads and away from Williamstown and Millers Roads. It also includes proposals for a new turn signal at the Williamstown Road-Thomas Street intersection (the dreaded Officeworks intersection) and what appears to be a permanent right-hand turn lane at Somerville Road for northbound traffic on Willy Road. To the best of our knowledge no action has been taken on any of the recommendations. We will now pursue the Roads Minister to ask which, if any, will be implemented and when.

The report was released after repeated requests and two separate Freedom of Information applications by Save Willy Road, and the insistence by the state government in the media this year that it was not obliged to release the report at all.

Read the report here.

STARTLING STATS ON SURGE OF inner west CONTAINER MOVEMENTS, 8 OCTOBER 2O21

The Port of Melbourne released its 2020 Container Logistics Chain Study, a detailed study of container movements in and out of the port, which provides valuable comparisons with an earlier study a decade ago. A sobering statistic: the number of imported containers transported to western suburbs (chiefly to transport depots or directly to importers) has more than doubled (108% increase) since 2009. Almost every container is moved by truck and that increase equates to an additional 77,000 truck trips each way now compared with a decade ago. Many are moved on Williamstown Road.

At a briefing provided to Save Willy Road and Maribyrnong Truck Action Group by Ports and Freight Minister Melissa Horne and Freight Victoria director ports, freight and intermodal Andrew Newman, we were told further progress has been made on what the government believes will be two important strategies to reduce truck numbers in the Inner West: allowing more use of the former Melbourne Markets site on Footscray Road for truck staging and container storage; and the expected opening of the Port Rail Shuttle between Port of Melbourne and Altona in October 2022.

The key issue with the rail shuttle is how many services it will run each week, and therefore how many containers it will take off the streets. The short answer: no one knows, though there is a commercial imperative for its operators to maximise services to turn a profit. A worst case scenario is five shuttle trips a week, which would move 420 TEU (twenty-foot unit equivalent) a week, or 21,840 TEU/year, which equals a miserable 5% of current western suburbs container movements. Ten trips a day would move 43,680 TEU/year, or 9.7% of current western suburbs container movements; 25 trips a week (five a day) would carry 109,200 TEU/year, or 24% of today’s load. The higher figure would make a significant difference, the lower figure would barely keep pace with the increasing rate of imports — in other words they wouldn’t take a single truck off the road.

Read the summary report here.

Read the full report here.

9 NEWS ON TRUCKS RAMPAGING THROUGH RESIDENTIAL STREETS, 20 SEPTEMBER 2021

The plight of Williamstown Road featured on a Channel 9 News story on freight trucks taking over residential streets. Our message is simple: “It’s insane that this government would think that this single lane residential road is an appropriate place to put even more trucks.”

Watch the video here.

ministers block OMBUDSMAN’s bid for transparency on willy road, 30 JULY 2021

The Victorian Ombudsman’s office advises that after a series of meetings and emails with the Department of Transport aimed at pressuring the department to release the long-overdue Millers Road-Williamstown Road Corridor Study final report, it has closed the case without result, admitting it can do nothing more in the face of what we can only assume is a calculated blocking strategy by three Andrews Government ministers.

Interdepartmental emails obtained under FOI have revealed that the final report was all but completed in October 2019 — but the department insists it remains in draft form and therefore exempt from release as an “internal working document”. The Ombudsman’s office confirmed it had power to intervene over the department’s failure to complete the report after more than 18 months. But as it turns out, all that was needed to stop the Ombudsman’s office in its tracks was for a minister (or ministers) to do … nothing.

The meetings and emails led to the department preparing a formal ministerial briefing in mid-June 2021, presumably with a recommended resolution that needed ministerial approval. The Ombudsman’s officer explained: “What makes this situation unusual is that, to provide a response to this office, the Department requires information from three separate Ministers. Under the Ombudsman Act 1973 (Vic) the actions and decisions of elected officials, such as Ministers, are specifically exempted from the Ombudsman's purview. What this means is, while the Department’s response is awaiting consideration by these Ministers, there is nothing that this office is able to do to assist you. Though this may change in the future, it is unclear at this time how long the Ministers may take to provide a response to the Department. As such, this email confirms that my consideration of your complaint has concluded and that I have closed your case. I acknowledge this is not the outcome you were seeking.”

So hats off to Roads Minister Ben Carroll, Transport Infrastructure Minister Jacinta Allan and Ports and Freight Minister Melissa Horne, the Member for Williamstown. In short, they know they can trump the Ombudsman — and block the public’s right to know — simply by ignoring the departmental briefing. If they never reply, the process stalls and the Ombudsman can do nothing more, so the Corridor Study report on Williamstown Road stays secret. The big question is: What are they hiding?

A-DOUBLES AND RED-LIGHT RUNNERS, 21 JULY 2021

From June 2021 Save Willy Road raised with the Department of Transport our concern that increasing numbers of super-long A-double container trucks are using Williamstown Road. 

The department has confirmed that a “small number” of permits has been issued for these vehicles to run the full length of Williamstown Road, provided they do not exceed 30m in length and 68.5 tonnes weight. The department admits other A-doubles are probably being driven on Willy Road without a permit and asked the National Heavy Vehicle Regulator to step up enforcement.

As part of our correspondence we provided two videos of B-Double freight trucks smashing through red lights at the intersection of Williamstown Road and Anderson Street at full speed. Worryingly, when one of those videos was posted on Facebook it attracted a host of abusive responses from truck drivers who claimed trucks simply can’t be relied to stop at red lights. 

Among the (more civil) responses were:

Glen Hewat: You got no idea. 50kmh? Do you know how long to pull it up? Obviously not. Get a life champ. 

Jayden Bamford: Truck drivers know lights change, but they don’t know when they will. Didn’t know truck drivers could predict the future. It would take 50m to stop a fully loaded double. If he tried he would have ended up half in the intersection.

Vince Marino: A fully loaded semi takes an average of 60 meters to stop, add the weight of the A trailer and that distance increases. Truck had no chance of stopping safely. He would’ve ended up  in the middle of the intersection which would have been a worse outcome. Maybe you need to go and drive one and gain the understanding of what it’s like to drive one before making judgments.

Excuses excuses. If B-doubles can't pull up safely at a red light at 50km/h, they simply shouldn’t be on Williamstown Road. If they can, why do drivers not even bother trying? Massive freight trucks storming through red lights is a horrifying threat for every other road user. They simply don’t belong here.

7 news on GOVERNMENT REFUSAL TO RELEASE THE CORRIDOR STUDY, 8 june 2021

Victorian Ombudsman puts pressure on the the Victorian Government to release the final report of its failed Millers Road-Williamstown Road Corridor Study which has done nothing to alleviate the predicted doubling of truck volumes on Williamstown Road after the West Gate Tunnel opens.

Watch the video here.

WILLIAMSTOWN ROAD DEBACLE REACHES VICTORIAN OMBUDSMAN, 7 JUNE 2021

The Age reports that the Victorian Government is adamant that it is under no obligation to release the final report of its Corridor Study into Williamstown Road despite complaints that are now in the hands of the Victorian Ombudsman.

Read the report here.

FOI documents expose Corridor Study spin and deception, 16 FEBRUARY 2021

Documents unearthed through a Freedom of Information request show just how far Department of Transport bureaucrats were prepared to stretch the truth after they abandoned the task of finding solutions to the impending onslaught of freight trucks on Williamstown Road once the West Gate Tunnel opens.

Save Willy Road launched the FOI process early last year, seeking all documents and emails relating to the abrupt closure in January 2020 of the Millers Road-Williamstown Road Corridor Study, seven months early.

The FOI request turned up 41 documents, nine of which were completely withheld, while many others were heavily redacted. Crucially, the document trove failed to include the Final Report of the Corridor Study, which was alluded to in an inter-office email, and we have launched an appeal to obtain that report, which belongs in the public domain. 

What the documents do reveal, however, is a clear attempt to deceive the inner west community about the pathetic outcomes of the Corridor Study, which the Andrews Government had insisted from the beginning would seek ways to reduce the negative impacts of a huge rise in truck numbers projected for Williamstown Road as a result of its grand tunnel plan. 

Possible measures the Corridor Study working group was directed to examine included truck bans on Williamstown Road and the “optimal use” of Grieve Parade, which provides a direct truck link between industrial precincts and the freeway without passing through residential areas. But for residents and users of Williamstown Road, the tortured 16-month Corridor Study process delivered just one tangible outcome: a speed limit reduction to 50km/h north of Francis Street.

But even as the Corridor Study process was being mysteriously shut down, the FOI documents show evidence of spin doctors working frantically behind the scenes, creating talking points, a communication and engagement strategy, pre-prepared Q&As and a desperate response to media inquiries, all of them rife with fiction and farce. The point of the spin was clearly to distract from the central fact that the Corridor Study completely failed to deliver a solution to the truck nightmare that was the trigger for the whole process.

And in that blizzard of spin, the Corridor Study outcomes came to also magically include:

• Pedestrian guardrails on Francis Street, near Wembley Primary School, and Napier Street, outside the Footscray police station. (FACT: No benefits at all for residents of Willy Road or Millers Road. In a further insult, the streets where those guardrails were installed are set for permanent truck bans when the tunnel opens — the very reason our truck numbers will double);

• Road resurfacing on Williamstown Road. (FACT: The resurfacing was carried out in December 2017, months before the Corridor Study was even established);

• A ban on “dirty trucks” on some inner west roads. (FACT: That ban was never implemented. It was a central part of Maribyrnong Truck Action Group’s Cleaner Freight Initiative, to which the Andrews Government signed up but then ditched at the 12th hour);

• A commitment to continue working with key stakeholders in the inner west community on minimising truck impacts. (FACT: Save Willy Road directly represents Williamstown Road residents. The DoT ignores many of our emails, remains secretive and defensive and has given no indication it has any plans for traffic measures to remove trucks from Williamstown Road.)

The bottom line: the documents make plain that the DoT did traffic modelling on the impacts of night truck curfews on Williamstown and/or Millers Road, decided it was not viable because it would overload Grieve Parade, then promptly terminated the Corridor Study, claiming the job was done. No effort was made to investigate expanding Grieve Parade’s capacity constraints.

And no surprise really: in early 2019, Corridor Study community representatives were dumbfounded to find that VicRoads was pushing for clearways on Williamstown Road north of Somerville Road, which would have banned residents from parking their vehicles outside their homes. It showed where VicRoads’ interests really lay: attracting more trucks, creating a nightmare four-lane freight route all the way to the pinch-point at Geelong Street. Outraged residents rallied and Save Willy Road was born.

The Corridor Study, pitched to Williamstown Road residents as the process that would actively search for solutions to spare our residential road from being transformed into a toxic, congested 24-hour freight route — the collateral damage of a government road project — turned out to be nothing but a lazy box-ticking exercise. 

Then again, why apply creative traffic management solutions to improve air quality and improve amenity in the Inner West when you can do nothing and just cover your tracks with spin doctors?

YET AGAIN, ALARM RAISED OVER POLLUTION LEVELS IN THE INNNER WEST, 7 SEPTEMBER 2020

A report in The Age on 7 September, “Crisis call on pollution in the inner west,” announced the findings of a taskforce set up by the Andrews government to investigate air quality concerns in Maribyrnong, Brimbank and Hobsons Bay and found air pollution was “a widespread and alarming problem in the inner west. Rates of hospitalisation for heart failure, asthma and heart disease are far higher in the inner west than in the general Australian population.

Links to the news report as well as the full report and summary are below.

The question is, what happens now? Many of these reports are produced and many just disappear. It is up to all of us to maintain pressure on our local MPs and the government to follow through with action to reduce the root causes of the pollution causing these problems.

https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/pollution-crisis-in-melbourne-s-inner-west-drives-up-hospitalisations-20200904-p55slu.html

https://www.environment.vic.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0029/486506/IWAQCRGReportFINAL.pdf

https://www.environment.vic.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0030/486507/IWAQCRGSummaryReportFINAL.pdf

YOU GET HEADPHONES! YOU GET HEADPHONES! YOU GET HEADPHONES! (OK, NOT REALLY)

Below is Infrastructure Minister Jacinta Allan’s response to a question from Catherine Cumming, our local upper house MP, on 18 August 2020. Catherine specifically refers in her supplementary question to Save Willy Road and the issue of speeding vehicles; Jacinta ignores that part of the question completely and refers only to noise-cancelling headphones, which would be impossible to sleep with anyway. When one Williamstown Road resident applied in early September for noise-cancelling headphones to block the thunderous roar of passing trucks during the nightly diversions while the West Gate Freeway was closed for construction work, they were told they were not available. Another resident was offered $2 earplugs.

… AND THERE GOES THE FIRST MAJOR CONTAINER PARK, 1 AUGUST 2020

Hopes of a realistic and achievable solution to the explosion in truck numbers on Williamstown Road have finally emerged this year (see posts below from 31 May and 3 April), with hopes for the relocation of container parks and logistics businesses from Brooklyn and Tottenham central to those plans.

In the first sign that such a plan is already taking shape, logistics and infrastructure giant Qube Holdings has recently sold a sprawling 13.6 hectare container park site at 385-397 Francis Street, Brooklyn (see photo and Google map below) for $65 million to developers Time & Place, who intend to create a business park, subdividing lots which will be targeted to small and medium-sized industrial developers, investors and owner-occupiers. The site is currently occupied by Chalmers Container Services and Malec Brothers Transport Group, whose trucks stream through the gates and on to either Francis Street, Millers Road or Geelong Road, with many of them possibly using Williamstown Road use a route as well. Read more details of the property sale here.

If the long-term strategy, driven by Ports and Freight Minister Melissa Horne, is to succeed, more container park owners will also need to be lured by the prospects of significant profits by cashing in and moving out.

GOVERNMENT’S THREE-PART PLAN TO REDUCE CONTAINER TRUCK TRAFFIC, 31 MAY 2020

A recent response from Ports and Freight Minister Melissa Horne to Save Willy Road (see letter below) finally presents in one document a coherent and plausible long-term strategy for reducing the level of container truck traffic through the inner west. 

It’s a chain of solutions that could bring significant benefit to Williamstown Rd which — along with Millers Rd — will bear the brunt of traffic impacts once the West Gate Tunnel opens and truck bans are introduced on other roads long used to access the port.

In our letter to the minister, we highlighted a section of the Port of Melbourne’s draft 2050 Port Development Strategy that called for the state government to consider and designate appropriate new and upgraded transport corridors to provide certainty to existing and future residential communities. That call aligns with our view — and that of both Maribyrnong and Hobsons Bay councils — that the government should be identifying a viable and appropriately located freight corridor away from our residential area. It is unacceptable that as the port freight task grows, more container trucks will be using Williamstown Rd as a shortcut to the port.

Minister Horne outlines two separate plans to relocate container parks away from Brooklyn and Tottenham as well as two other closely linked projects designed to move more container freight on to rail.

It’s gratifying to see a minister identifying specific strategies to fix a major issue of health, safety and amenity for the inner west, rather than the usual vague assurances that our health and welfare is the government’s “utmost priority”.

PORT RAIL TRANSFORMATION UPDATE, 12 MAY 2020

Progress on improved rail infrastructure at the Port of Melbourne continues at its tortuous pace as part of what is being touted as a plan that will help to take trucks off inner west roads.

Port management announced on 30 April that after a strong Expressions of Interest phase, conditions had been met to allow the next stage of the process to go ahead, with hopes for construction to begin before the end of the year. Completion date is set for 2023.

As planned, the Port Rail Transformation Project will take rail tracks and sidings deep into Swanson Dock, so 600-metre long trains can be loaded with up to 84 TEU (twenty-foot equivalent) containers, in comparison with a B-double truck that can carry just three TEU. The port rail facility is planned to link with a Western Interstate Freight Terminal at Truganina, which will also incorporate the planned (but trouble-plagued) Port Rail Shuttle, to be completed by 2024.

Details of the port’s rail plans are available here and here. Port of Melbourne is yet to provide an estimate of what proportion of its steadily growing container freight levels it expects to move off road and on to rail.

UPDATE ON TOTTENHAM/BROOKLYN CONTAINER PARKS, 3 APRIL 2020

In the past three weeks Save Willy Road has had meetings with Footscray MP Katie Hall and Andrew Newman, who is Freight Victoria’s Director, Port, Freights and Intermodal. The purpose was to discuss our concerns about the sharp rise in freight trucks using Williamstown Rd that is predicted to take place once the West Gate Tunnel opens in 2022 or 2023.

At the meeting with Katie Hall, we asked if she supported the extension of Grieve Parade northward to connect with Market Road; such a road connection, less than 2km long across basically waste industrial land, would allow trucks travelling between the Tottenham/Brooklyn container parks and the Port of Melbourne to connect directly with the West Gate Freeway via Grieve Parade, taking them well away from the residential thoroughfare of Williamstown Road. That road plan has been strongly supported by Hobsons Bay City Council.

Hall, whose electorate includes Grieve Parade and Market Rd, expressed little interest in such a plan. Instead she believes the solution is to simply get the container parks out of that location. And if that happens, they will stop running down Williamstown Rd and there would be no need for the Grieve Pde extension.

The meeting with Andrew Newman from Freight Victoria on 2 April (also attended by two representatives of the Maribyrnong Truck Action Group) was intended to further explore that option and basically address two questions: how would that happen, and when?

What is the problem? The container parks in Tottenham and Brooklyn are sited on low-value industrial land that currently offers convenient access to the Port of Melbourne, mainly via Sunshine Rd, Millers Rd, Buckley St, Somerville Rd and Francis St. As Webb Dock ramps up its operations, an increasing number of container trucks are also accessing it via Williamstown Rd and West Gate Freeway. When the tunnel opens, 24/7 truck bans will come into force on Buckley St, Somerville Rd and Francis St, forcing those trucks to find other routes to the port. Many trucks will then use Williamstown Rd to access either the freeway or the West Gate Tunnel to reach the port; those assumptions probably underpinned West Gate Tunnel Project predictions of a doubling of truck numbers on Williamstown Rd once the tunnel opens.

What is the plan? It has two major elements. The first is that operators of those container parks will realise they are poorly located, with the likelihood of encountering much higher congestion on Williamstown Rd or other routes, with a resultant loss of efficiency and increased cost. They will therefore seek to move their operations to other sites with better access to the freeway. They might opt to move their operations closer to the proposed Port Rail Shuttle hub at Altona, where they could happily work 24 hours a day. They might also choose to set up at the former Melbourne Wholesale Market site as land comes free over the next five years.

The second part of the plan is a gradual rezoning of the land on which the container parks sit. The land is too contaminated to be used for housing, but Freight Victoria believes it could be rezoned to attract what Newman described as “hipster industry” — smaller light industrial operations. Once rezoned it would rise in value, either encouraging owners to sell up or — if it is leased — gradually pricing out those who lease the land for container parks.

When would this happen? Newman believes few container park owners have considered the disruption that impending permanent truck bans will present to their operations; they do not yet realise it will not be viable to remain where they are. He said: “They don’t think the truck bans apply to them.” However it is widely accepted in government that the tunnel and the curfews have been designed to drive up toll traffic for Transurban, so there is little prospect of exemptions. He believes those operators will wake up to the reality closer to the tunnel’s completion, or soon after and at that stage begin moving quickly. He is unwilling to put a timeframe on the land rezoning: it is a complex process with many stakeholders and would be a long-term plan; “there will have to be a lot of convincing in the planning departments.”

What is the government doing? As a senior officer in Freight Victoria he is beginning to turn his attention to getting it done. His department will soon make contact with container park operators to have “honest conversations” with them about their future headache with 24/7 curfews and their options; according to Katie Hall the department will also assist those businesses to locate more suitable land. Freight Victoria is also starting conversations with the Planning Department to try to get the ball rolling on rezoning and amended planning schemes.

As Webb Dock expands operations, won’t Williamstown Rd remain a convenient route to reach Webb Dock from container parks along Sunshine Rd? Yes, but Newman says those companies will not be profitable by running only to Webb Dock; it will still be a relatively small part of their overall port runs. Therefore it will not justify remaining in their present location along Sunshine Rd; it will still be more efficient for them to relocate with better direct freeway access.

If this is such a good plan, why has neither the Infrastructure Minister nor the Roads Minister mentioned it in communications with Save Willy Road or MTAG? Why was it not offered as a solution during the Corridor Study or Environment Effects Statement process? Newman says it was never a secret, but it was also not well known. He says throughout the negotiations over MTAG’s (now abandoned) Cleaner Freight Initiative, ministerial focus was on “road management” solutions rather than a land use solution. Nor has he briefed either of those ministers. “Because of the processes, land use issues didn’t cut through. I knew I had to bide my time.” However he says Melissa Horne, as Ports and Freight Minister, is well aware of the issue and is pushing Newman and Horne’s senior adviser Samantha McArthur (a former MTAG president) to spread the message.

Are there any obstacles? Apart from possibly planning department intransigence, he says the COVID-19 pandemic has thrown a massive spanner in the works. He says all budgets are being redrawn because of the massive spending, so there are no certainties. There is another risk too: what happens if Andrew Newman or Sam McArthur move from their current roles? Will their successors be as committed to this project as they are?

• 13 Jan 2020, 774 ABC Radio

• Interview with Peter Anderson of the VTA and Robyn Seymour from the Department of Transport regarding the failed Smart Freight Partnership. Robyn Seymour falsely claims "the community shifted their position" regarding Williamstown Rd.

  Listen here

• Jan 2020, Save Willy Road Group statement condemning the axing of the Millers Rd/Williamstown Rd Corridor Study working group and the Cleaner Freight Initiative

Save Willy Road Group statement:

Termination of the Williamstown Rd/Millers Rd Corridor Study

Save Willy Road was given the hugely disappointing news last week that the Department of Transport has terminated the Millers Rd/Williamstown Rd Corridor Study working group.

First, a quick recap. The Corridor Study was first recommended by the Andrews government’s Inquiry and Advisory Committee, whose job was to assess the West Gate Tunnel Environment Effects Statement (EES). That group had noted that Williamstown and Millers Road residents would suffer a drastic loss of amenity and safety once the tunnel opens because of “a significant increase in traffic” — namely, a doubling of truck numbers on Williamstown Road.

The Planning Minister, Richard Wynne, embraced that recommendation as part of his final approval of the tunnel project in November 2017. Minister Wynne made clear that the purpose of the Corridor Study would be to determine what mitigation works could be employed to “improve the safety, accessibility and amenity” of residential communities on and near Williamstown and Millers Roads because of the expected surge in truck numbers.

The former MP for Williamstown, Wade Noonan, also stated explicitly that “the objective of the corridor study will be to examine options and actions to reduce the negative impacts, such as safety, accessibility and amenity on Williamstown and Millers Road residents” created by 24/7 truck bans on other streets once the West Gate Tunnel opens. Noonan also told the Star Weekly newspaper that the Corridor Study would aim to “restore community amenity in the inner west”.

Sadly, the Corridor Study process, which included representation from community members and councils, was a farce from the beginning. The original Terms of Reference were skewed towards VicRoads finding the most effective ways to squeeze more trucks on both those roads and among VicRoads’ first proosals was to extend clearways on Williamstown Road north of Somerville Road, banning residents from parking their cars outside their homes and turning their street into a full four-lane truck route between the West Gate Freeway and Geelong Road.

It was that shock recommendation that prompted the formation of the Save Willy Road residents’ action group. When this group complained about the distorted Terms of Reference, VicRoads agreed to re-draft them and pledged to keep the Corridor Study open for another 12 months to August 2020 to resume the search for ways to minimise the adverse effects for Williamstown and Millers Roads. It also pledged to examine ways to make the best use of the north-south route of Grieve Parade for freight movement.

The Corridor Study never met again. Without any warning or explanation, the Department of Transport on January 16, 2019 announced the Corridor Study working group was closed. That marked the end of “consultation” with the inner west community and local councils.

Cleaner Freight Initiative

The decision comes in the wake of the state government’s betrayal of the inner west with its dumping in December 2018 of the Cleaner Freight Initiative (CFI), a groundbreaking inner west truck curfew scheme brokered by the Maribyrnong Truck Action Group and truck industry group the Victorian Transport Association. The scheme, to discourage the use of older, high-polluting trucks in suburban streets through stricter curfews, was to have included Williamstown Road; when the government trumpeted its launch in July 2019 it quietly dropped Williamstown Road from the plan. Pathetically, in the end the scheme never existed beyond a media release.

The government’s only explanation for last week’s decision to abandon the whole CFI was the utterly false claim on ABC Radio by a senior bureaucrat that “the community” had demanded that the CFI require a curfew for all trucks on Williamstown Road. She also made the baffling claim that the government has installed pedestrian barriers on Williamstown Road as part of its mitigation works. We know of no such barriers.

The Save Willy Road group condemns the government’s axing of both the Corridor Study and the CFI and their rank dishonesty in explaining their actions. Their actions tell us that the Andrews government is no longer interested in listening to or helping the inner west community on issues of freight truck movements. It has gone through the motions and will now do what it wishes.

We will continue the fight for our health, safety and amenity. We hope you continue to support us.

• August 2019, ABC Radio National - Life Matters
  How Clean is the Air You Breathe?
  Listen here

• 31 July 2019, Star Weekly
  Council Backs Williamstown Road Curfew Calls
  Read here

• 21 July 2019, The Age
  The Air Stinks of Diesel: Residents fear rat runs for dirty old trucks
  Read here

• 9 July 2019, Save Willy Rd Media Release
  Residents of Inner West Accuse Government of Betrayal Over Smart Freight Initiative Announcement
  Read here

• 13 May 2019, Star Weekly
  Grieve Parade Truck Bid Backed
  Read here

• 1 May 2019, Channel 7
  Inside the Operation to Keep Rogue Truckies out of Suburban Rat Runs
  Watch here

• 30 April 2019, Star Weekly
  Residents Slam VicRoads Study Group as a "Sham"
  Read here

• 11 April 2017, The Age
  Scrap Truck Curfews, Build East West Link to Help us Grow Says Port of Melbourne
  Read here