THE West Tamar community from Riverside to Exeter will be heartened by today's announcement that Vos Constructions is due to start work on the new Legana Primary School before the end of the month. As minister Roger Jaensch correctly noted it is one of the fastest growing regions not just in Tasmania, but the whole country, and Legana was named as one of the top 10 best towns in Australia by demographer Bernard Salt in Friday's Australian. But the people of Legana already knew that. The school when it's finished will make the town and the area around it even more desirable.
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It's interesting to note in passing too that West Tamar Council's general manager Rolph Vos is associated through family connections to the newly appointed construction contractor. He's also a member of the Australian Building Codes Board as the Australian local government representation.
While the main focus will be on the building of the new school and rising anticipation over its opening in 2025 (incidentally an election year), other issues bubble below the surface. One will be the roads that provide access to the school, for parents dropping off and picking up their children. Jaensch's colleague Michael Ferguson said "high priority" road projects associated with the school included duplication and shoulder widening of the West Tamar Highway.
This is estimated to cost $100 million. The state had a commitment for $16 million from the former Morrison Government, given a week or two before the last federal election, but it's likely to be relying too on federal money even for the money the state has pledged. The state also has its hand out to the feds for the $240 million for the Macquarie Point stadium and around $300 million for the proposed bridge across the Tamar linking Newnham and Riverside due to be completed within five years. The West Tamar road works are critical though for the viability of the school.
Parents thinking about sending their children to the new school will be concerned at the state of the road at the moment. Clearly there will have to be nothing less than major improvements, a complete re-build, to make it safe for parents exiting and joining the highway. Then there are the slower school buses, needing to exit and enter safely. Other drivers will have to get used to the fact that the highway's speed limit near the school will be 40 km/h before and after school.
It's a race track at the moment. Your scribe driving at the 80 km/h speed limit was tailgated by a large black four wheel drive and he couldn't help but notice too the skid marks leading up to the first roundabout coming into Legana where a car has skidded over the roundabout and collected one of the black and white arrow signs on the way through. There is nothing to indicate a roundabout ahead except a tiny little roundabout warning sign the width of the road before the roundabout. Anyone driving at the speed limit has no way of knowing there is a roundabout ahead (unless they are locals and are familiar with the situation) and slowing, sharply, in time.
Sure you'd expect the government to sort this out. It is so obvious. But the government has a woeful record at making the state's roads safe to drive on, the roundabout in the middle of the Midland Highway at Perth, and a railway track across the so-called highway at Conara being examples. Then there is the entire length of both the Tasman and Bass Highway goat tracks.
The West Tamar community will be proud of its new school when it is built. But the larger and more costly challenge is fixing up the road to enable parents and students safe access.
