Transcript – Press Conference: Black Spots Programme

GRAHAM QUIRK: Well ladies and gentlemen I’m pleased to have with me today Minister Paul Fletcher, the Minister for Major Projects, Territories, and Local Government. We’re here at the intersection of Blunder Road and Reedy Road at Oxley.

This is a black spot, and it’s one of 10 projects that the Minister and the Federal Government will be assisting Brisbane City Council to deliver over the next year. There’s no doubt that accidents cause injury, and also cause traffic congestion. And Team Quirk is very much about reducing both. So I’d like to hand over to the Minister, and welcome you again Minister Fletcher.

PAUL FLETCHER: Well thank you very much Lord Mayor Quirk. I’m very pleased to be here in Oxley to announce the first of seven projects out of a total of 10 being funded by the Turnbull Government, working with Brisbane City Council under the leadership of Lord Mayor Quirk to address an important black spot. This is the Turnbull Government working with Brisbane City Council to make our roads safer. This is part of a national Black Spots Programme, $500 million between 2014-15 and 2018-19, and here at Blunder Road and Reedy Road in Oxley a significant traffic light project, over $1 million being spent here, which is going to make this road and this intersection safer and more reliable. And can I say what a pleasure it is to work with Brisbane City Council under the very capable guidance of Lord Mayor Quirk; it’s a very, very professional, efficient operation, it’s two governments working together for the benefit of the people of Brisbane, and it’s a real pleasure to work with Lord Mayor Quirk and to see the benefits of the leadership he is showing and delivering for his community.

QUESTION: What’s wrong with this particular intersection?

GRAHAM QUIRK: Well this intersection has seen 22 significant accidents over the last five-year period, and this is what this program targets: it improves safety, and it also delivers congestion-busting outcomes. And that’s what we’re on about as Team Quirk, doing both of those things, providing a safer road network with less congestion.

QUESTION: Can you go into a bit more detail about what you’re actually going to be doing to upgrade this intersection?

GRAHAM QUIRK: So this particular project will involve a right-turn pocket, it will involve signalisation and a u-turn facility. It’s about improving safety, and also reducing congestion.

QUESTION: And why this one? What about all the other black spots in Brisbane?

GRAHAM QUIRK: Well there’s a number of projects of course that the Federal Government is assisting Brisbane City Council with in funding. And so there are a range of projects that will have a similar outcome to this one.

PAUL FLETCHER: Can I just add to that. Under the Black Spots Programme is that there is a committee of all the interested stakeholders that makes decisions for Queensland about which projects should get priority for funding under black spots. Total funding for Queensland in 2015-16 is $32.5 million out of the total of 500 million over five years across the nation, and a very substantial proportion of the Queensland funding is being spent here in Brisbane, and the Turnbull Government is working very closely with Brisbane City Council under the guidance and leadership of Lord Mayor Quirk to target that money to the areas of greatest need to deliver the greatest benefits in terms of safety, lives saved, number of crashes reduced, and importantly reducing congestion and making our roads easier to use.

QUESTION: Can you run through some of the other six projects?

GRAHAM QUIRK: Well there’s projects across the city, north, south, east and west of Brisbane. So that’s the great thing about this particular project. It’s about addressing those key areas of safety and as we know when accidents happen they also generate congestion. So less accidents means less injury and less congestion.

QUESTION: And when will work start?

GRAHAM QUIRK: Well works are on an ongoing basis so work will start here, this month at Oxley, but there are other projects that are being rolled out on an ongoing process and I thank the Federal Government for the very strong support of this program.
Now I’ve just got one or two other things to mention today. As people would be aware, the nominations closed for the Lord Mayoral candidates yesterday. I would just today be calling on all candidates to run a campaign which is about ideas for Brisbane. Positive campaigns and not campaigns based on negative advertising but based on the ideas to make our city of Brisbane an even better city. I’ve made it very clear what the issues are in this election campaign. Team Quirk is very much about addressing transport and traffic solutions for our city. It’s what we’ve been committed to over the last decade and we’re on about improved transport, also traffic and cycleway opportunities for our residents. We’re also about building a lifestyle city as well. Can I just say that this campaign also is very much about making sure that we have the issues out there, that there are new ideas for our city, building on the success of the past.

QUESTION: Are you suggesting perhaps that other people are already running negative campaigns?

GRAHAM QUIRK: Well all I’m saying is that this campaign- I believe the people of Brisbane simply want to know what the ideas are for this next period of Brisbane’s history. We’ve built on a very strong foundation of undertaking traffic congestion busting projects. We’ve built a lot of big infrastructure in this city. I’m saying that this campaign ought to be a clean campaign based around the ideas for Brisbane. That’s what people deserve, that’s what they ought to be hearing about over this next four and a half weeks.

QUESTION: But are you suggesting that some people have already started a negative one?

GRAHAM QUIRK: Well I’m just suggesting that there is likely to be a negative campaign out there and I’m saying that all candidates, close the ballots now, ought to be committing to positive campaigns about their ideas for how to make our great city of Brisbane better.
Now very quickly on the Metro- I just say this- the major announcement that I’ve made in this election campaign is for a Metro subway system. It’s a $1.54 billion project. What it does is it provides a guaranteed travel time of 6.5 minutes from the Gabba to the city. It’s a two minute frequency system and it will build enormously on the capacity that we have for public transport in our city and so the first thing that we will do if successful on 19 March is to develop the business case around that and to get on with some detailed designs so that we can present those to Infrastructure Australia in due course. We will be the major funder of this particular piece of infrastructure.