Funding has been secured to recommence works on Mona Vale Road West two years after a change in government saw tools down for the vital infrastructure.
Federal Member for Mackellar, Dr Sophie Scamps, who is facing an election on 3 May, as well as State Member for Pittwater, Jacqui Scruby, have jointly claimed a win by securing $250 million in the Federal budget.
The Mona Vale Road West project includes upgrading 3.4 kilometres of Mona Vale Road and widening two lanes to four lanes between McCarrs Creek Road in Terrey Hills and Powder Works Road in Ingleside.
Other plans for the upgrade include relocating the intersection of Mona Vale Road and Tumburra Street to the west by about 40 metres and providing a new traffic signal intersection at Kimbriki Road and Mona Vale Road (more details on further upgrades will be mentioned further down).
What happened?
Works were originally underway when the previous Liberal government allocated $340 million to the budget for the project in 2019, kicking off construction with the Mona Vale Road East upgrade.
But tools were put down halfway through the Mona Vale West upgrade when the NSW Labor government cut its funding in 2023, leaving only $5.5 million in the 2024/25 State budget for design planning.
Independent ‘teal’ Jacqui Scruby, who was elected after incumbent Liberal MP Rory Amon was forced to resign over child sex allegations, has made funding for Mona Vale West one of her primary missions as local member. Ms Scruby has been active on her stance getting the road completed, meeting with NSW state Premier Chris Minns last December at the abandoned Mona Vale Road West to view the half finished job. She also gave a speech to NSW parliament last month calling for action on the site.
But it was the Federal member who delivered, with a media release from the Federal Labor party confirming that the $250 million was committed (not an election promise) during the recent budget announcements.
Dr Scamps pointed to a press release where Minister for Infrastructure, Catherine King, confirmed the money for the Mona Vale Road West Upgrade has been allocated in the Budget forward estimates.
“In simple terms, that means the money is in the bank,” she said.
Labor candidate for Mackellar Jeffrey Quinn said he had been “advocating for this investment for quite some time, and I’m thrilled to see Labor answering that call.”
We asked Dr Scamps and Ms Scruby if they would agree the surprising federal generosity so close to an election looked similar to pork barrelling, which is generally seen as the practice of putting money into areas important to a political party’s success. Dr Scamps is not a member of the Labor party, she is an independent or ‘teal’, however, her success keeps the usually dominant Liberal party out of the seat which benefits Labor.
“It’s not pork barrelling if it’s a good use of taxpayer funds, and by any metric, whether it’s safety, whether it’s bushfire evacuation, whether it’s relieving congestion in a major city, Mona Vale Road West upgrade meets all those hurdles,” Ms Scruby said.
“Yes, it’s ahead of an election, but it’s also the budget cycle time and the time when we need to be making sure roads like this are invested in.”
“Jacqui has hit the nail on the head,” Dr Scamps contributed.
“Pork barrelling, when you look at the definition, is the misuse of public money to try to win seats. When you look at pork barrelling examples, it’s like the car park rorts, the sports rorts, where money was funded for car parks where there weren’t even train stations. That is a misuse of money. In this case, it is desperately needed.”
According to the Institute of Internal Auditors – Australia, pork barrelling is the spending of public money raised from all taxpayers on programs to influence the votes of people who live in the political electorate to receive the benefit.
Regardless, the pair believes the secured funding was a success because of their collaborative advocacy highlighting this was a must-have not a nice-to-have project.
Was a deal done with Labor?
Liberal candidate for Mackellar, James Brown, said the Liberal Party remained committed to completing the works. “The State Liberal Party has always committed to funding Mona Vale Road West. That was a commitment when we were last in government, and that hasn’t changed,” Mr Brown said.
He also posed the question ‘will Dr Scamps be supporting a Labor Teal Green government in exchange for this $250 million commitment?’.
This is something Dr Scamps has vehemently denied.
“There has been no deal done, as some people have suggested.”
“I want to be absolutely crystal clear. I secured the $250 million in federal funding for completion of the Mona Vale Rd upgrade – the first federal funding ever secured for the project – as a result of 3 years of constructive and consistent advocacy. It was not part of any deal, or any back room promise about support in a hung parliament. Quite the opposite: it was achieved through a positive and collaborative approach to politics.”
“I’ve been advocating at the federal level. Jacqui has been advocating very hard at the state level. This is the time to get it done. We’ve got a half-finished road. It is urgent. The community is outraged and I think it is just absolute common sense that this gets finished now, rather than waiting another 10 years for a half-finished road to be finished,” Dr Scamps said.
“What I really liked from the Federal Infrastructure Minister was she said that common sense and constructive advocacy is what got us across the line on this.”
What’s Next
So far, there are not a lot of details in terms of the project’s timeline. Ms Scruby said there are likely to be new approvals “on a range of things”, including Environmental Impact Statements (EIS) for new designs and community consultations.
There is also the $90 million funding gap left by the money cut from the State budget. However, Dr Scamps said the original amount wasn’t going to be enough to complete the road and the boost in Federal funding would ease the pressure on the State’s pending contribution.
“We now have $250 million from the Federal government, the $340 million was not going to be enough to finish that road. So having funding now from the federal level of government, which wasn’t there previously, is how we overcome that barrier,” Dr Scamps said.
Ms Scruby will continue two advocate for the state money.
So What Will Be The Upgrades?
The State Government’s design planning for the road is still underway. How much they can allocate, EIS and community consultations will be factors in the deliverance of the final product. A timeline for this is yet to be provided.
However, previously this is what Transport for NSW said the Mona Vale Road West upgrade would include:
- Widening Mona Vale Road between McCarrs Creek Road and Powder Works Road from two lanes to four lanes with a central concrete safety barrier
- Providing a new traffic signal intersection at Kimbriki Road and Mona Vale Road, including additional dedicated turning lanes and a truck climbing lane
- Relocating the intersection of Mona Vale Road and Tumburra Street to the west by about 40 metres and changing access to left turn in and left turn out only
- Closing the existing intersection at Mona Vale Road and Addison Road to general traffic and restricting access to emergency vehicles only
- Constructing a new local road connection between Bungendore Street and Powder Works Road, using the existing Harvey Road corridor, and extending the new local road east of Addison Road to meet the intersection of Mona Vale Road and Powder Works Road
- Removing bus stops near the intersection of Tumburra Street and re-directing bus services along the new local road connection and Tumburra Street to serve existing and future land uses
- Providing new and improved fauna connections including a 40 metre wide fauna bridge over Mona Vale Road and two fauna underpasses
- Constructing a shared use path on the northern side of Mona Vale Road between McCarrs Creek Road and Addison Road
- Upgrading street lighting for the full length of the project
- Constructing retaining walls and/or sandstone cuttings at various locations along the alignment
- Landscaping over the length of the proposal.
