Upgrades to Ballarat’s Sturt Street are revisiting the city’s past to build a safer future on one of its busiest roads.

Member for Wendouree Juliana Addison said as part of upgrades currently under way at the intersection of Sturt and Talbot streets, construction crews have been busy building new bluestone kerbing in order to retain the heritage feel of Sturt Street’s iconic median gardens.

Crews have spent the past week familiarising themselves with the skills and processes required to build the new kerbing, which will form part of a new double U-turn configuration.

Each of the 35 blocks used to create the new kerb has been cut to fit and the blocks are individually installed onto a bed of crushed rock by hand, as opposed to traditional concrete guttering, which is poured into frames.

Regional Roads Victoria has worked with the City of Ballarat and Ballarat Heritage Watch to ensure the new works are in keeping with the area’s history.

The project is also helping to support a regional Victorian business, with the custom-made bluestone blocks used in the project quarried, shaped and sourced by Port Fairy-based company, Bamstone, which supplies all the bluestone used in Ballarat’s heritage kerbing.

Twenty-nine people have been injured as the result of 22 crashes at this intersection between in the 10 years up to 2018, making it one of the worst accident blackspots in central Ballarat. The new configuration will eliminate potential conflict points between vehicles and reduce the severity of crashes if they do happen.

The upgrades are part of a wider project to boost safety at six high-risk intersections along Sturt Street.

Under the package of works, six high-risk intersections along Sturt Street are set to be upgraded, including Raglan, Ascot, Talbot, Errard, Windermere and Lyons streets. Similar kerbing will also be installed at the Errard and Lyons street intersections.

Works to install new traffic lights are already under way at the Raglan and Ascot street intersections, while upgrades to Errard, Lyons and Windermere streets are set to be delivered between now and early 2021.

The upgrades along Sturt Street are all part of the Victorian Government’s $1.4 billion investment into reducing road trauma and are being delivered by Regional Roads Victoria, in partnership with the Transport Accident Commission.

Quotes attributable to Member for Wendouree Juliana Addison

As the main thoroughfare of our city, it is vital that we make Sturt Street intersections safer for all road users, cyclists and pedestrians. Sturt Street is also home to many important monuments and statues, so we have taken this into consideration for the design and build of our safer road network.