The often congested roundabout on New Lake Entrance Road that adjoins the Oak Flats Interchange. Photo: Andrew Sutton.
She was ashen-faced, panic-stricken – a visible expression of ‘’I’m desperately sorry/How do I get out of this situation?’’. It’s not every day you encounter a vehicle almost head-on in a roundabout.
Perhaps she’d just avoided a collision or was an overseas driver? I don’t know.
Our GPSs might have instructed us thus: “In 100 metres, take the word shit and merge it with show, then take a deep breath, hover the palm of your right hand over the centre of your steering wheel and take the third exit at the second roundabout”.
Yes, I’m talking about the Blackbutt Bellyflop – the Pioneer Drive/New Lake Entrance Road roundabout – and the Oak Flats Interchange (OFI).
Sounds impressive, right? And it is. An impressive case of traffic mismanagement.
These twin terrors turn two-minute town trips into traffic turmoil – slooowly taking you into myriad choke points.
How did we get here?
Within days of the completion of the bypass, new clots appeared. Three or so years of referred pain later and the townsfolk are still on the waiting list for corrective surgery. Some have performed their own bypass of sorts – Woolies Stoney Range, anyone? Or perhaps to take a left they turn right and do a complete circuit of the ‘flop. Others head to Shell Cove to join the M1 there, while others plain avoid the area altogether.
Often there’s no need to stop at roundabouts; with decent anticipation you can sail right through without a hitch. A conjoined pair appears to be too much of a good thing.
A Transport for NSW (TfNSW) crashes map shows incidents at the roundabouts, perhaps surprisingly, number only in the teens for the years 2019 through 2023. Not a black spot, but a black mark against the design phase, surely. It appears a utilitarian eye looked over this area of the M1 and the good people of Oak Flats/Blackbutt/Flinders et al got the bum deal.
TfNSW has said an additional left-turn lane is planned for the ‘flop – a $4m project “part of a program of improvements to reduce queuing … while a more permanent solution is developed”. Construction is expected to start “in early 2025” – more than three years “after long queues of traffic were experienced” on opening of the OFI. The queues are now longer than the line-up for loo roll peak COVID.
How long does it take to develop said permanent solution? What might it cost? What about the jam coming from the east at Pioneer Drive? Perhaps removing the on-ramp onto the M1 from this direction and opening a new one at College Avenue would help?
With the recent ‘’update’’ by NSW Roads Minister John Graham and Shellharbour MP Anna Watson about preparatory work for on/off-ramps at Dapto, the suburb’s natives would do well to scrutinise proposed options to avoid similar problems. At the time Mr Graham said TfNSW would conduct detailed modelling on how traffic moved in the area and use the data collected to predict future traffic movements. Here’s hoping for a better outcome there.
The rubber meets the road mid-year for the proposed fix for the OFI/Blackbutt Bellyflop. Until then, I’ll bellyache.
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