Airport Link, Brisbane

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Airport Link
Queensland Roads
Length	~6.5km
General direction	North-South
From	Toombul
To	Bowen Hills
Places passed	Lutwyche

The Airport Link is a tunnelled motorway grade road which is planned for the northern suburbs of Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. It will connect the Brisbane central business district and the North-South Bypass Tunnel to the East-West Arterial Road which leads to the Brisbane Airport. It is proposed to be built in conjunction with the Northern Busway in approximately the same corridor. The estimated construction cost of the Airport Link tunnel is reported to be over $3.4 billion, with the eventual toll charge being $4.85 per trip.^[1]

The proposal was out for tender with three consortia entering the bid to win the Airport Link contract. The three bidding consortia are BrisConnections, NorthConnect Motorway Pty Ltd and Northern Motorway group. The winning consortium was BrisConnections.

Gympie Road, Stafford Road and the East West Arterial are all key routes connecting with Airport Link that will experience increased traffic congestion as a result of the project. Traffic on connecting roads at the southern connection of the tunnel will increase 6% more than with the "do-nothing" option by 2022, while connecting roads on the northern connections will increase by 13% [Tables 9-126 and 9-127 Traffic and transport technical report, Airport Link Environmental Impact Statement http://www.airportlinkeis.com/OtherLinks/EIS/pdfs/Vol3-TechPapers/01_Traffic_and_Transport.pdf).

Lutwyche Road is meant to be one of the key beneficiaries of Airport Link, yet by 2026 traffic will have only been reduced by up to 3% in some sections, while south of Newmarket Road it will increase by 36% compared with 2004 (table 9-10 in the Traffic and Transport technical paper).

Traffic and congestion on suburban roads surrounding the project will also increase by 2026 as a result of Airport Link. Newmarket Road (+89%), Hamilton Road (+32%), Kedron Park Road (+39%), Albion Road (+60%) and Maygar Street (+19%) (table 9-10 in the Traffic and Transport technical paper).

Airport Link will lead to minuscule increases in vehicle speed (compared to a no AL option) and will lead to a reduction in vehicle speeds over the next 20 years. Table 9-8 shows (Traffic and Transport technical report) that in 2012 vehicle speeds in the metropolitan area will increase from 52.5 km/h without AL to 53.4 km/h with AL (+0.9km/hr); in 2022 vehicle speeds will increase by just 1.1 km/h as a result of AL; and in 2026 by 1.1 km/h. Overall, AL will reduce vehicle speed on the network from 53.4 km/h in 2012, to 49.6 km/h in 2026. The project will therefore fail to achieve the objective of improving journey times due to reduced speed. Thus the promise of reduced pollution due to free-flowing traffic cannot be met.