Along the Highway

My path into town takes me behind a crash barrier along by the Great Western Highway, which is one of tne busiest roads in the state ... if not the country. Despite recent upgrades, something will have to be done to accommodate the huge increases in heavy vehicle traffic which is expected to double again in the next few years.

Blackheath sits on a narrow section of north/south mountain ridge, which it occupies almost totally from edge to edge. The highway narrows basically to two lanes right here if only because maintaining four or more lanes of express passage will mean mowing down an historic town centre, building sophisticated engineering works out over iconic national park locations, resuming sections of historic suburbia or burrowing underneath via an horrendously expensive tunnel.

Whatever happens, given present government debt due to Covid19, it'll take a while to get started, while we all choke in diesel fumes.