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44 Business View Australia - January-February 2016
PUBLIC WORKS &
ly go through a prioritization process
and then it goes to the elected body of
the Council who approves the budget.
“Now, as part of our budget process,
we also have some discretionary capi-
tal funding for projects that are identi-
fied by the community. These may be
projects that the community has iden-
tified as being a safety issue or a com-
munity want or desire.
“These are primarily new asset pro-
jects. From an asset management or
financial management perspective, we
do tend to focus on renewal or main-
tenance of our existing assets without
spending too much money on new as-
sets.”
Road project
The total urban and rural road length
in Council’s area is 803 kilometres. An
important road project that was recent-
ly completed at a cost of $245,000
was the realignment of the junction
between Church Road and Elderslie
Road at Broadmarsh.
The intersection of these roads was
at an angle of 30 degrees and the pro-
ject entailed converting this into a ‘T’
junction. The project met its stated ob-
jective of maximising sight distance
and improving parking facilities in the
vicinity.
The junction is critically located as it
is a School Bus Stop Area. The work
on realigning the junction was initiat-
ed in response to the lodgement of a
petition by the local community with
Council. As the project served to en-
hance safety levels for school children
it received Government funding in the
form of $90,000 from the Road Safety
Black Spot Program.