√NSW Government pledges additional $500 million to fix flood-damaged roads

The mammoth task of repairing the state’s flood-damaged roads has been given a boost, with a half-billion dollars provided to local governments.

After a year of flooding caused significant damage across the state’s road network, the NSW Government has announced a $500 million boost to support councils tasked with the urgent repairs.

The money is in addition to $50 million provided to metropolitan and regional councils to perform emergency pothole repairs in the wake of multiple statewide flooding events – as well as the $1.5 billion budgeted for road maintenance annually.

“We recognise potholes are a major hazard right now,” NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet said in a media statement.

“This critical funding injection will help every council across the state patch up potholes as well as carry out other emergency repair work.”

It’s estimated more than 170,000 potholes have been fixed in regional areas of the state in the past year, with hundreds of thousands awaiting repair. However, many potholes are soon damaged again after being soaked repeatedly with wet weather.

While local governments in Greater Sydney and regional areas of NSW are eligible for the cash injection, the State Government says all work must be carried out by 31 December 2023.

“Following the heavy rainfall and floods we provided early access to flood recovery funding for impacted councils and this additional funding announced today is to make sure councils can complete those vital repairs,” NSW Minister for Metropolitan Roads Natalie Ward said in a media statement.

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“On state-owned roads across Greater Sydney, the equivalent of standard football fields 139 times over have been repaired already and this latest funding will mean the potholes on your local street can be repaired by councils,” she said.

“In addition, we are trialling new ways to fix potholes faster with a rapid sealing ‘cold mix’ product and investing in technology that finds potholes before they find you through using vehicles to track and prioritise repairs across our roads.”

In March 2022, a report by the Federal Government found the poor quality of Australia’s roads were a major contributor to country’s annual death toll.

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