Western Highway, Victoria

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Western Highway Ballarat Road



Length	320 km
General direction	West-East
From	Dukes Highway, SA/Vic. border 25 kilometres west of Kaniva, Victoria
via	Nhill, Dimboola, Horsham, Stawell, Ararat, Beaufort, Deer Park, Sunshine
To	Princes Highway, Footscray, Melbourne
Allocation	Rural section SA/Vic. Border - Burrumbeet: Formerly Suburban section Caroline Springs - Deer Park: Formerly Deer Park - Footscray: Proposed to replace
Major Junctions	Rural section Borung Highway Henty Highway Wimmera Highway Henty Highway Pyrenees Highway Sunraysia Highway Suburban section Caroline Springs Boulevard Westwood Drive Station Road Western Ring Road St. Albans Road Anderson / McIntyre Roads Churchill Avenue Gordon Street

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See also: Western Freeway (Victoria)

The Western Highway is part of the principal route linking the Australian cities of Melbourne and Adelaide with a length of approximately 320 kilometres (not including the Western Freeway from Ballarat to Caroline Springs). It is a part of the National Highway network and designated as National Highway A8. It continues beyond the Victorian border as Dukes Highway, the other section of the Melbourne-Adelaide National Highway.

The Western Highway is the second busiest national highway in Australia, in terms of freight movements, with over five million tonnes annually. It provides the critical link between the eastern seaboard and South Australia and Western Australia. The towns along the way, including Ballarat, Ararat, Stawell and Horsham, are major agricultural and manufacturing centres.

[edit] Route

The Western Highway begins at the Victorian-South Australian border, east of Bordertown. It is mainly a high quality single carriageway from there to Ballarat, with adequate numbers of overtaking lanes. However, the highway does pass through several agricultural centres, for example Horsham, slowing down traffic significantly.

Just north-west of Ballarat, the Western Highway becomes the Western Freeway , adopting freeway standards with two lanes running each way, and begins bypassing most of the towns the old alignment of the highway used to serve. Plans are underway for the end of this freeway to be extended from the current terminus at Burrumbeet westward to Ararat.

It reverts back to highway standards, with three lanes running in each direction, at Deer Park in Melbourne's western suburbs, but keeps the M8 designation until the intersection with the Western Ring Road.

Beyond that, it carries the older National Route 8 shield to central Melbourne, losing its dual carriageway status at Braybrook and becoming another clogged two lane arterial road, with many stretches sharing the road with trams. However, just before the central business district, the road becomes a leafy avenue, Flemington Road.

[edit] Future route numbering

At the completion of the Deer Park Bypass in late 2009, the bypassed Western Highway will be signed as . This means that metropolitan route 8 will follow the older from Caroline Springs to Parkville in Melbourne.

Construction is underway on the Deer Park Bypass to extend the freeway to the Western Ring Road around the suburbs and relieving the highway of its excessive traffic loads by diverting trucks onto the significantly wider West Gate Freeway to Melbourne instead of the old Ballarat Road. The official route numbering for the Deer Park Bypass will be signed as the . The M8 route will end where the Deer Park Bypass meets the Western Ring Road .