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State Development

Case Study

Northbridge Tunnel Upgrade: Turning Four Lanes into Six

The Northbridge Tunnel on Graham Farmer Freeway is a $15 million project funded by the State Government. The upgrade reconfigured to allow a third lane to the tunnel in each direction and was fully functional in April 2013. As one of Perth’s top five most well-known road structures, the project was subjected to heavy public scrutiny.

The Northbridge Tunnel upgrade began in mid-2012 in conjunction with the Mitchell Freeway Widening Project as part of a package of transport solutions to improve the CBD road network and address the challenges associated with Perth’s increasing population. The upgrade project was delivered by Main Roads and the tunnel ‘operate and maintain’ contractor Lend Lease.

The tunnel was designed and built to ultimately have six traffic lanes – three eastbound and three westbound. However, converting the existing four traffic lanes and two breakdown lanes into six traffic lanes was a major public concern as there will be no breakdown shoulder. Prior to starting the project, we engaged internal and external stakeholders as well as technical experts in an Operational Risk Review. This review enabled the project team to confirm the risks associated with the project from a construction and operational perspective. Mitigation of the identified risks included:

• Provision of a breakdown response capability called the Incident Response Service to remove broken down vehicles from the tunnel.
• Enhanced community awareness through a campaign advising road users of the new movements within the tunnel using 3-D fly throughs. These were made available to the public via various social media platforms.
• Revision, upgrade and promotion of tunnel signage.
• Implementation of the Stakeholder and Media Communications Plan aimed at minimising the impact of necessary tunnel closures on road users.

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