The New England Highway is part of the National Land Transport Network and is a major freight and passenger route, forming part of the inland Sydney–Brisbane corridor. The corridor services a high proportion of heavy freight vehicles and is the main road freight route between the Hunter Valley coalfields and the Port of Newcastle.
Under the existing alignment, the New England Highway passes through the centre of towns such as Singleton and Muswellbrook. Traffic congestion, reduced land freight transport productivity, safety issues (due to the mix of heavy vehicles and residential traffic in the town centres) and amenity issues are the principal problems. The current alignment also limits the extent to which High Productivity Vehicles can be mobilised along the route.
The proposal includes a number of potential projects to upgrade the New England Highway, including:
- bypasses of the towns of Singleton and Muswellbrook
- duplication between Belford and Singleton
- duplication between Singleton and Muswellbrook
- realignment at Rocky Cut (north of Scone).
The proposal is designed to aid the efficient movement of freight from regional exporters to the Port of Newcastle, which is essential to supporting economic growth and productivity in New South Wales.
The Australian and NSW Governments have committed $1.1 billion and $400 million respectively towards projects on the New England Highway, including Singleton and Muswellbrook Bypasses, Belford to Golden Highway duplication, priority projects between Tenterfield and Newcastle and the completion of planning the Bolivia Hill Upgrade.
Infrastructure Australia has completed Stage 3 evaluations of the business cases for Singleton Bypass and Muswellbrook Bypass on 8 September 2022 and 10 February 2023, respectively. These were assessed as funded proposals, given the commitments already received from the Australian and NSW governments. The evaluation summaries are available at the links below. Both projects seek to improve travel reliability and safety on the New England Highway, particularly for road freight supporting the Upper Hunter and the northwest New England region, as well as amenity within the Singleton and Muswellbrook townships.
The proponent is to complete business cases for the remaining projects as part of the upgrade program (Stage 3 of Infrastructure Australia’s Assessment Framework).