Mitchell Highway safety work takes a walk on the wildlife side
The next stage of work to improve road safety on the Mitchell Highway between Bathurst and Orange will not only focus on saving human lives, it will also focus on the preservation of local wildlife.
A key part of planning for the safety upgrade at Vittoria West is to protect local fauna that have made their homes in hollows in the roadside trees.
Transport for NSW Acting Regional Director West Holly Davies said a comprehensive tree audit of the project site had identified native trees that needed to be retained to continue providing safe habitat for birds, possums, lizards and snakes.
“The safety upgrade work includes removing all non-native trees, shrubs and weeds within the work zone, while the aim is to retain as many native trees as we safely can,” Ms Davies said.
“The narrow road corridor at this location on the highway makes detailed inspection of all tree hollows prior to felling a safety challenge.
“To safely carry out this work and mitigate the potential impact on our sensitive wildlife, the Transport project team, with assistance from our environmental specialists, implements various techniques to minimise these risks, such as soft felling.”
Soft felling involves the use of an excavator with the capacity to hold and lower trees to the ground. Tree sections are then moved to a suitable nearby location, away from live traffic, where fauna can access a suitable escape route to a safer area.
The trees are left overnight in these locations to allow any fauna to escape before they are inspected again and relocated or removed from the site.
“This technique mitigates injuries to our wildlife, significantly reducing injury to fauna during the process, while Transport crews prepare for upgrades to the highway,” Ms Davies said.
Ms Davies said the safety improvements at Vittoria West, about 24 kilometres west of Bathurst, would deliver safer journeys for all road users on this key regional route.
Other work will include widening the Mitchell Highway to provide a 1.4-metre wide painted centre median with flexible safety barrier in sections, building a dedicated right hand turning lane at Gardiners Road, laying new asphalt pavement, and installing a guardrail at strategic locations throughout the project.
“Residents, tourists and freight operators make around 10,000 trips a day on the Mitchell Highway between Bathurst and Orange and we’re proud that this ongoing program of upgrades is making each one of those journeys a little safer,” Ms Davies said.
“Vittoria West is a known crash hot spot on the highway and these improvements will greatly reduce the risk of future crashes.
“We are committed to doing what we can to improve safety on regional roads right across the state and our work on the Mitchell Highway is an important part of that.”
Previous work completed on this corridor between Bathurst to Orange includes the East Lucknow upgrade completed in July 2018; safety upgrade at Oakey Creek Lane, completed in October 2019; Guyong, completed in September 2022; Vittoria East and East Guyong, completed in December 2023; Vittoria Curve, completed in May this year; and Pretty Plains intersection upgrade, completed in September.
Tree-clearing work at Vittoria West will start on Monday 28 October with main construction work on the $23.45 million project expected to start in 2025.
More information: Mitchell Highway safety upgrades between Bathurst and Orange.