Victorian Greens MP Colleen Hartland is urging Transport Minister Terry Mulder to announce plans for the Truck Action Plan
By Ruza Zivkusic | March 11, 2011
The future of the Truck Action Plan is still uncertain as the new Victorian Government is yet to make a stand, the Greens MP Colleen Hartland says.
She has put questions about the plan to the Transport Minister Terry Mulder in State Parliament last month and is still waiting for a response.
Hartland
has asked whether a night time truck curfew will be implemented in Melbourne’s inner west.
The Minister was also asked
if ramps connecting the West Gate Freeway and Hyde Street, Footscray, will be built and what other initiatives would be implemented to reduce road freight and the number of trucks on residential streets.
He has 30 days to make a statement, with the deadline due today,
Hartland says.
“What really concerns me is the fact that anything that the Labor party proposed or funded, wether it be good or bad projects, the new government is saying they’re not going to touch on those projects,” Hartland says.
“They just don’t seem to know what they’re doing at this stage.
“The previous government was slow enough but we just don’t get any sense at all at the moment about what’s going to happen.
“They don’t seem to have a plan to get freight onto rail, which is where it should go because they didn’t have their own policies during the election; we’re still finding out what they think and what they’re going to do,” Hartland says.
“They need to act; stop talking and complaining about the previous government.”
The two-stage plan was announced by former Transport Minister Tim Pallas, which was recommended by transport guru Sir Rod Eddington to remove thousands of trucks from Melbourne’s inner west and improve freight access to the Port of Melbourne.
The initiative was intended to be delivered in partnership with the Federal Government, with plans to include a new link from the West Gate Freeway into the port via Hyde Street.