The City of Launceston council will vote on the master plan at its meeting on Monday. 

Community consultation was open for four weeks and as a result changes have been made to the draft plan. 

The changes include: 

These adjustments will be added to the already planned installation of traffic lights at the Inveresk intersection and Invermay Road, to replace the roundabout. 

City of Launceston’s general manager Michael Stretton said the improvements would also include an upgrade of signal controller units and software to improve vehicle flow. 

“The existing roundabout at the Inveresk site entrance doesn’t function well now, and our traffic modelling shows us that it will fail to handle further demands traffic growth will place on that intersection,” he said. 

“Upgrading signal controller units and software on that route in to and out of the city will go a long way to alleviating those issues, coupled with the installation of traffic lights with safer, dedicated pedestrian points.” 

A new link road will also be constructed behind Bunnings to help take traffic away from the already congested Lindsay-Charles street intersection. 

This new link road will help divert traffic behind the site onto Gleadow Street which will be supplemented with a new signalised intersection at Goderich and Gleadow streets. 

Mr Stretton said minor modifications were made to the initial design for the new intersection. 

“However, the double right-hand turning lane heading south on Goderich Street will help move large volumes of traffic away from Lindsay Street,” he said. 

“Once our traffic signals are synchronised correctly, our modelling shows that traffic flow along Goderich Street will not be adversely impacted. In fact, it will provide greater flexibility to meet the varying demands of these intersections throughout the day, including major events and emergency management.” 

The council said it was delighted at the level of community input, with the focus now to start rolling out the staged projects. 

“The increase in development in and around Lindsay Street has seen traffic flow impacted for several years and council has been working diligently to address these well-publicised traffic issues,” Mr Stretton said. 

“We believe that while these improvements won’t solve all the problems we face, they will have a significant, positive effect on reducing congestion in and around the Bunnings area.”

The aim of starting the improvements within the next couple of years is to have issues addressed before the University of Tasmanian relocation. 

“With Riverbend Park coming online early in the New Year, and with the recent Silos development and the proposed National Automobile Museum of Tasmania facility due for completion in the coming months, having these solutions in place well before the new university campus was a top priority for us,” Mr Stretton said.  

In the next one to three years, improvements to the western and eastern sides of Lindsay Street and the south of Gleadow Street will be completed. Improved traffic flows on Forster Street between Goderich Street and Invermay Road will also occur. 

Medium-term projects include a corridor review for pedestrians and cyclists on Invermay Road, adjustments to the Charles Street Bridge as well as bike lanes and bike trails on Holbrook and Gleadow streets. 

The council was still waiting on an update from the Department of State Growth on plans to upgrade traffic flow across the Charles Street Bridge, Mr Stetton said. 

The upgrades include 13 projects, with four funded by the state government’s $40 million Invermay Traffic Improvement Package. The link road jointly funded by the council and the government. The council will funding the remaining eight projects. 

All projects are expected to be completed within five years. City of Launceston council first announced its plans for the upgrades in April this year. The meeting will be held at 1pm on Monday at Town Hall.