Road renewal in Shellharbour was a key topic at this month’s council meeting. Photo: Kellie O’Brien.
Road repair in Shellharbour has been put under the spotlight, with Shellharbour city councillors responding to community frustration about recent works.
At a recent council meeting, councillors unanimously supported a motion by Cr Kellie Marsh to review the city’s road maintenance strategy after widespread community complaints about recent road resealing projects.
It followed an earlier council item to approve a suite of Integrated Planning and Report Documents, including the budget and delivery program and operational plan.
Within that, Cr Marsh proposed an amendment to allocate up to $500,000 in capital savings from the transport program towards asphalt road renewals, addressing the growing community concerns about infrastructure maintenance.
Council staff confirmed these additional funds would be drawn from any savings in the 2025-2026 budget where other projects came under budget.
“The asset management strategy indicates that over a quarter of council’s entire $2 billion portfolio of assets relate to roads and transport for the current replacement cost of $563 million,” Cr Marsh said.
“Further, the asset management strategy notes that capital expenditure planned for renewal of assets over the next 10 years will continue below the value required to renew 100 per cent.
“Assuming we continue at the current spend, it will be more than 50 years to return and renew over 450 kilometres of Shellharbour roads.
“That’s why we need to take more action.”
Cr Marsh said while recent road resealing had drawn criticism due to loose stones and rough surfaces outside residential properties, asphalt resurfacing was well received by residents.
“We need to look into the future and we need to look at new technology,” she said.
In her separate motion, she called for councillors to receive a briefing on the city’s road maintenance and renewal strategy, including the impact, condition and safety of the roads, and to have reseals potentially removed from the capital works program.
She also called for residents to receive more effective communication about proposed roadworks.
“The mayor and I were recently out on the ground inspecting some of these roads where the work had taken place,” she said.
“We did see firsthand what many of you in the community have been raising about the limited access whilst this was happening – the general disruption, the rocks, etc.”
She said she acknowledged the frustrations and short-term impacts on people’s quality of life.
“Road sealing is important for the long-term safety and condition of our infrastructure, but how we go about it and the technology we use and the communication matters,” she said.
“That’s why tonight, I’m calling on council to look into alternative approaches, which may offer some efficient and less disruptive solutions for future projects.”
Supporting the motion, Cr John Davey said 20 per cent of the city’s roads were in “poor or very poor” condition.
“I also note that in terms of satisfaction, we do have a decline in community satisfaction rating with respect to our roads,” Cr Davey said.
“It’s a diabolical situation, because we’re facing deficits, and this was an exercise in not only pre-empting future potential damage on those roads by getting in early, but also to do it in a way that wouldn’t cost as much as if we were to asphalt.”
He said those he had spoken to over the past couple of weeks expressed “two emotions, equally”.
“One is anger. The other one is confusion,” he said.
“It’s anger that you have done this to us, and the other one is confusion. Why have you done this to us?”
He said while he commended Cr Marsh on finding potential pathways for additional funding, if more money was to go back into roads, council needed to identify the things they were willing to go without.
Mayor Chris Homer said part of the issue was the volume of roads needing to be renewed, but believed Shellharbour was in a better position than many due to having a small footprint.
“We have been experiencing very severe rains ever since 2022,” he said.
“I’ve even noticed in my role as I go around the state and visit other LGAs, some LGAs are in deep trouble with their roads.
“We’ve all been briefed that replacing the surface itself costs 10 times more than resealing.
“Trying to keep our roads in good shape until we get to the point where we need to reseal roads, is something we also need to do.”
Cr Mitchell Ellis and Cr Moira Hamilton echoed Cr Homer’s comments in assuring the community that council was listening.
Cr Rob Petreski said council staff were doing the best they could with limited funds.
He said with several classifications of roads, he didn’t want to see the removal of reseals or any type of repair or roadwork due to certain treatments possibly being appropriate for certain types of roads.
Both motions were passed unanimously.
