EDE a 'white elephant': Landcare

That's the question Queanbeyan Landcare has asked of Council in its recent submissions to the draft integrated planning process, which will govern Queanbeyan's financial future over the next decade.

The documents- which were adopted at Wednesday night's Council meeting- allocate $44 million for the EDE in the 2017/18 financial year, to be drawn from a mix of developer contributions, government grants, and potentially Council loans. 

But Landcare's first recommendation to the planning process was to defer all transport infrastructure construction until a comprehensive, regional plan has been developed.Landcare representative Tom Baker pointed to a raft of new roads connecting the Queanbeyan region with Canberra, proposed as part of the ACT Government's Eastern Broadacre employment corridor. 

He said the EDE could turn out to be an "expensive white elephant."

"We're concerned that in the long term that road might turn out to be a bit of a white elephant. It's going to be a very expensive road and it may not do what it's intended to do," Mr Baker said.

"The first reason is that people might still choose to go down Old Cooma Road or through Jerrabomberra. And the bigger reason is that in the long term, there will be new transport infrastructure around the north of Queanbeyan as part of the Eastern Broadacre study.

"People will love the EDE as a shortcut to the coast or up to Sutton Road, but that might be all it will do," he said.

The ACT Government's Eastern Broadacre plan is investigating a new employment corridor along Canberra's eastern edge, stretching from Tuggeranong to Majura Park. Although planning is in its infancy and new road infrastructure potentially 10 years or more away, Mr Baker said the future roads- including a new northern bypass of Queanbeyan- could make the EDE redundant. 

However Council has backed its Googong and Tralee traffic study of 2008, and general manager Gary Chapman said the plan "made provision for future growth and future demands on both the ACT and Queanbeyan road network."

"There are no plans to re-examine the traffic model, but as actual traffic data is being collected annually and other development impacts occur both here and in the ACT the traffic model is re-run with this new data to test the assumptions in the model. There is nothing new that warrants a new traffic model being investigated," Mr Chapman said.

He said there would be cross-border discussions with the ACT as the Eastern Broadacre precinct developed, but at this stage it was still a "desktop exercise."

"The ACT Eastern Broadacre Study is only a future land use study and whether there are any cross border implications and their timing or any impacts for that matter will obviously involve ongoing discussions between the ACT, NSW and Queanbeyan governments," Mr Chapman said.