Page 3610 - Week 11 - Tuesday, 22 November 2022
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sustainable reforms for transport. The feasibility study has been completed just recently. It will then inform finalisation of the final active travel plan, which I am looking forward to releasing next year.
MR BRADDOCK: How will the ACT government prioritise active travel actually coming in and out of the town centre?
MR STEEL: I understand as part of the feasibility study multi-criteria analysis was undertaken to assess the relative priority of each of the potential routes of active travel in the Gungahlin area to assist in prioritising future capital works and indeed prioritising it in the cycle network plan and the active travel plan. They have also used the route status in the network and safety existing active travel infrastructure as a criteria for that ranking.
MS CLAY: Minister, why does the government spend a tiny fraction on active travel versus car travel?
MR STEEL: Because roads cost more to build and maintain compared to active travel paths. That is the reality of it. Cars are much heavier, trucks, B-doubles are much heavier and cause wear on the pavement. We need to build them to a certain pavement specification to make sure they can handle those loads. This is where a majority of our transport occurs.
Of course active travel is a priority for the government and we want to encourage even more people to take up cycling and walking, which is the key aim of the new draft active travel plan. Through the range of steps outlined in that plan we are hoping to see more people using active travel and that will see further investment in active travel in the future. This is also part of our transport strategy overall to invest in more of the sustainable forms of travel; public transport including light rail but also in active travel. We have certainly seen a very significant pipeline of investment in active travel projects.
When we do invest in road projects, we invest in strategic road corridors. We are investing not only in the road itself but public transport that runs on the road in terms of buses as well as public transport stops and active travel infrastructure. Not only on-road cycle lanes but also off-road protected cycle lanes as well. You will see that more and more in the future. We are continuing to work to develop with stakeholders best practice active travel design guides which will see better prioritisation of pedestrians and cyclists in our road infrastructure design in future.
Light rail stage 2A—traffic planning
MR COCKS: My question is to the Minister for Transport. Minister, in July 2021 you announced that you would deliver record congestion for Canberrans, stating:
That’s going to mean a significant amount of congestion that our city probably hasn’t seen before in its history.
Since I joined the Assembly, working parents have been contacting me because they are worried the extra commute time from your tram project will make their lives
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