2012 ANNUAL REPORT

On 26 October 2011, Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II arrived in Perth in a 17-car convoy for the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM). In the largest ever gathering of world leaders in Australia, over 50 Heads of Government, Ministers, Senior Officials and their delegations travelled to Perth. This event brought an estimated $80 million into the WA economy and Main Roads was proud to have played an integral role in ensuring the safe passage of over 3,000 delegates, including 1,000 media personnel, working 24 hours a day over the 28 to 30 October weekend.

As the agency responsible for providing traffic management for CHOGM, we started our preparation in late 2010. This international event brought together teams from Main Roads, WA Police, City of Perth and the Public Transport Authority to manage traffic activities. Over 200 traffic management personnel were involved in managing and implementing road closures and related traffic impacts. The CHOGM Traffic Operations Centre was created specially to manage traffic activities, allowing the continuity of operations during road traffic changes for the community.

In keeping with Main Roads' Traffic Operations Centre's motto – “Keeping WA Road Users Moving”, an enhanced one-stop information portal was created, the Traffic Roads Info Point (TRIP) which uses a variety of media to reach road users and the broader community. Road traffic information was delivered via email, SMS, commercial and community radio stations in Perth. Perth has approximately 1.2 million car owners, and with TRIP, Main Roads was able to reach almost 83% of all Perth drivers, providing them with traffic updates during the CHOGM.

In the days leading up to CHOGM, the Main Roads website traffic almost doubled with 41,822 views of the CHOGM FAQ. During this period, our Twitter account grew by 355 followers, attracting over 800 visits back to the Main Roads website with CHOGM-related tweets. On top of providing traffic-related information to the public, Main Roads' Customer Information Centre answered more than 1,000 calls from the public during CHOGM. Calls ranged from how and when people could see the Queen, what road closures were in place, to members of the public reporting protest banners hanging off Freeway overpasses.

CHOGM was the biggest single event management project ever undertaken by Main Roads. We successfully achieved our objectives in supporting the Police to provide safe, efficient and effective movement of delegates. We also minimised traffic congestion for the remaining road network which were impacted by parallel events and other activities during CHOGM. It was an excellent and valuable experience for Main Roads to be part of the CHOGM Taskforce.