Western Port Highway is a highway in Victoria, Australia, linking the south-eastern fringe of suburban Melbourne to the port of Hastings nearly 30km to the south[4] on the western coast of Western Port, after which the highway is named.
Route
Western Port Highway commences at Lyndhurst Interchange, where South Gippsland Highway and the alignment of South Gippsland Freeway meet at Lynbrook, and heads south directly from the southern end of South Gippsland Freeway over a bridge crossing South Gippsland Highway as a four-lane, dual-carriageway road, over the Cranbourne railway line, passing through a set of traffic lights at Portlink Drive and Moreton Bay Boulevard, passing through a roundabout at Glasscocks Road, and traffic lights at Thompsons Road. The highway runs onwards further south, meeting Cranbourne-Frankston Road in Cranbourne South, and continues south to North Road, before narrowing to a dual-lane single carriageway road and continues south to meet with Baxter-Tooradin Road in Pearcedale, before eventually terminating at an intersection with Frankston–Flinders Road, 2 km north of Hastings.
For most of the route the speed limit is 100 kilometres per hour (62 mph), with shorter sections of 90 kilometres per hour (56 mph) and 80 kilometres per hour (50 mph).
History
Western Port Highway was originally a single carriageway road called Lyndhurst Road in the 1960s, renamed some time after. The passing of the Country Roads Act of 1958[5] (itself an evolution from the original Highways and Vehicles Act of 1924[6]) provided for the declaration of State Highways and Main Roads, roads partially financed by the State government through the Country Roads Board (later VicRoads). A southern extension to the existing declaration of Dandenong–Hastings Road, subsuming a section of Tyabb–Tooradin Road between Somerville and Hastings, was declared a Main Road on 9 May 1983.[2]
Dandenong-Hasting Road was progressively upgraded to a divided highway between South Gippsland Freeway and Cranbourne–Frankston Road during the 1990s, as dramatically increasing freight traffic volumes to and from Hastings necessitated major upgrades, including eliminating the level crossing with the Cranbourne railway line with an overpass in 2001.[7]
The passing of the Road Management Act 2004[9] granted the responsibility of overall management and development of Victoria's major arterial roads to VicRoads: in 2004, VicRoads re-declared the road as Western Port Highway (Arterial #6230), beginning at South Gippsland Freeway at Lynbrook and ending at Frankston-Flinders Road in Hastings.[4]
Dandenong-Hastings Road was signed Metropolitan Route 65 in 1989. With Victoria's conversion to the newer alphanumeric system in the late 1990s this was replaced by route A780. After further upgrades, this was converted to route M780 between Lynbrook and Cranbourne South in 2000,[10] with a further extension south between Cranbourne South and Langwarrin after further duplication in 2009.[11]
VicRoads had planned to convert the highway to a six- to eight-lane freeway standard between South Gippsland Freeway and about 1.2 km south of Cranbourne-Frankston Road with full grade-separated interchanges at Glasscocks, Thompsons, Hall and Cranbourne–Frankston Roads, and a half-diamond interchange (north-facing ramps only) at Ballarto Road, with a report released in August 2014,[12] however the State Government abandoned any plans for the upgrade, which was estimated to cost $1 billion, in mid-2016.[13]
Upgrades
2001 – Duplication of 4.4 km between South Gippsland Freeway in Lynbrook and Thompsons Road in Lyndhurst, including overpass of Cranbourne railway line, completed January 2001, at a cost of $30.5 million.[7]
2009 – Duplication of 3.9 km between Cranbourne-Frankston Road in Cranbourne South and North Road in Langwarrin.[11]
^State Government of Victoria. "Road Management Act 2004"(PDF). Government of Victoria. Archived(PDF) from the original on 18 October 2021. Retrieved 19 October 2021.
