Flinders Highway, Queensland

Flinders Highway
Queensland
Flinders Highway (green on black)
General information
Type Highway
Length 754 km (469 mi)
Route number(s) A6
Former
route number		 National Route 78
Major junctions
West end Landsborough Highway (National Highway A2), east of Cloncurry
 
East end Bruce Highway (National Highway A1), Townsville
Location(s)
Major settlements Julia Creek, Richmond, Hughenden, Charters Towers
Highway system
Highways in Australia
National Highway • Freeways in Australia
Highways in Queensland

Flinders Highway is a highway that crosses Queensland east to west, from Townsville on the Pacific coast to Cloncurry (Barkly Highway continues from Cloncurry to the Northern Territory border at Camooweal and beyond). Flinders Highway passes a number of small outback towns. Typical outback landscape predominates towards the inland. Formerly National Route 78, Queensland began to convert to the alphanumeric system much of Australia had adopted in the early-2000s and is now designated as A6. Flinders Highway is also known as Overlander's Way.[1] Its entire length is part of the National Land Transport Network (formerly Auslink).[2]

Approximate road distances (in kilometres) of towns from Townsville along the highway

Towns

Charters Towers

Charters Towers, 133 km to the south west from Townsville. A former gold rush town with a population of 30 000 in 1890. At that time it was known as "The World" because it seemed to be the centre of everything. Presently it is a centre for cattle grazing, with gold mining continuing to be an important industry. Much of the elegant gold rush architecture of the nineteenth remains in place and is a tourist attraction.

Pentland


Hughenden

Located 243 km further on, Hughenden, the administrative centre of Flinders shire is in the heart of sheep and cattle country.

Richmond

Richmond, a former gold rush town located 112 km further west. Currently a pastoral centre.

Julia Creek

Julia Creek, 147 km further west, another pastoral settlement

Cloncurry

Cloncurry, former copper-mining town located 139 km west from Julia Creek. The first regular Qantas flights started between here and Charleville in 1922 and Royal Flying Doctor Service of Australia service started here in 1928. Nowadays it is an important road and rail junction. Flinders Highway ends here.

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Outback Australia - Australian Outback". Outbacknow.com.au. Retrieved 2013-07-21.
  2. ↑ http://www.nationbuildingprogram.gov.au/whatis/network/images/National_Land_Transport_Network_Road_Corridors_QLD.pdf

External links

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the Tuesday, December 15, 2015. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.