Exciting new mugging opportunity with Bowen Place to get an underpass

The GDE is the most expensive above-ground road in australia per kilometre of road (well, allegedly). This underpass will go down in history as the most scrutinised and agonised over in Australia’s history, when measured in terms of person-hours per square metre of concrete spent designing, consulting, delaying and finally building the damn thing.

If they had chosen a bridge – it could have been designed to not impact the vista too much.

Hopefully the underpass will be wide, well lit, well drained and well cleaned – urine smell will be a given!

OpenYourMind said :

One frustrating thing was that the NCA resisted an overpass because it would have heritage impact in terms of the views.

Considering the amount of trees around the place there would have been bugger all impact on the heritage values of the views.

The underpass is a good idea. The various solutions were discussed at length in an open forum. The forum was well advertised including on signs at the crossing and through various committee’s that were lobbying to make the unsafe Bowen Crossing safer. I’m an experienced cyclist and that crossing is a challenge for me – particularly as cars fly around the blind(ish) corner at well over the 60km/h limit. Getting a family across that road would be a nightmare.

The nice thing is that whatever solution is put in, it will make it possible to loop the central basin
without having to cross roads. The central basin path is heavily used by walkers, runners, cyclists.

One frustrating thing was that the NCA resisted an overpass because it would have heritage impact in terms of the views. This heritage before safety attitude was disappointing.

damien haas said :

Of course the most obvious solution – stairs rising directly from the cycle path to the bridge was never presented as one of the offical options, probably due to being too sensible and costing too little. this underpass idea is ludicrous.

Stairs only help people walking, not those on wheels for whatever reason. A ramp from that point would be rather long, or have to circle out over the water.

The underpass was suggested by people commenting on the feedback website
as an alternative to the options given.

IMO either a bridge or underpass would work, as long as it removes the crossing from the road. I would slightly prefer a bridge option though depending on the design of the underpass. I would be curious to know what the technical difficulties with the bridge were since the NCA did mention in response to the underpass requests that they didn’t put it forward due to drainage and personal safety reasons

thedude said :

Great, the govt obvious listens to the public and experts in the field! Agree with the comment here that the underpass has the potential to increase the muggings in the area. Great place for the drug users to hang out as well. Obviously the overpass was a cr@p idea and Canberra needs more road disruptions for months on end….Good one NCA – Thanks for making my ride a little more unsafe!

Soo, whats the correlation between and under pass and more muggings? I’ve used thr canberra under passes for years, all over canberra, as yet not mugged once.

The potential for drug users to hang out there… Wtf really goes through peoples heads? Where are these druggies coming from? Are they catching a taxi there to hang out or what?

I dont know the pros and cons for an under pass or over pass, but scare mongering for the sake of a head line, seems kind of pathetic.

Since when have muggings been a problem in the Parliamentary Triangle?

Great, the govt obvious listens to the public and experts in the field! Agree with the comment here that the underpass has the potential to increase the muggings in the area. Great place for the drug users to hang out as well. Obviously the overpass was a cr@p idea and Canberra needs more road disruptions for months on end….Good one NCA – Thanks for making my ride a little more unsafe!

Why the hostile reaction? I’m no fan of the NCA, but this seems sensible. Extra infrastructure paid for by the Commonwealth Government is a good thing.

The worst thing about this seems to be the NCA’s appallingly badly written press release which is about twice as long as it should be and full of unnecessary commas.

By “technical difficulties” they mean “the NCA director’s brother’s company only does excavations and has no experience building bridges.” And by “some people asked the NCA to reconsider an underpass” they mean “the NCA director’s brother.”

What a load of hogwash.