SIR, – ‘Hear hear’ to The Weekly Advertiser editorial August 28 on the need for a ring road for Horsham.  

The pedestrian crossing across McPherson Street is a ticking time bomb.  

Not only adjacent to a primary school it is also an important pedestrian and gopher link from the CBD to the hospital.  

Worse still McPherson Street is actually three highways between Baillie Street and Wilson Street, – the Western, Henty and Wimmera highways.

A speed-limited southwest link as suggested by the editor would enable Wimmera Highway traffic to connect with the Western Highway without travelling through the middle of town, as well as work as a temporary truck bypass for the Western Highway. 

This is desperately needed, as anyone who has seen trucks going straight through the red light at the Baillie Street-McPherson Street intersection will attest to. 

These massive vehicles just keep rolling through after the lights have changed.  

Even if you have the green light on the other side of the intersection you are not about to take them on.

A northwest link from O’Connor’s corner to the Henty Highway north of town would complete a ring road and enable traffic on all three highways to move freely without going through town.

Having completed the ring road you then get to work on the full-on four-lane 110kmh freeway bypass via ‘Option 2’ Dooen to Wail – and all the massive business opportunities that would bring to Dooen, Horsham and the entire region by putting three highways and the rail-freight hub in close proximity to each other. 

How many other cities in Victoria have a chance to do something like this?

Do we as a community have the wherewithal to take this on?  

Or will we be like Ballarat and have a major highway like the Midland Highway from Geelong to Castlemaine running right through the middle of town?

Russell McKenzie

Haven

The entire September 11, 2019 edition of The Weekly Advertiser is available online. READ IT HERE!