By Alan and Ronda Wakeley - Members, Dural Village Residents Association
Thank you for your article in the February 2021 issue of Dooral Roundup regarding traffic issues in the Kenthurst, Annangrove and Dural areas.
Let me endorse your comments and highlight a new problem. First some background. We live in the heart of Dural on Galston Road, just 100 metres from the intersection of Old Northern Road with Galston Road, near the Dural Post Office. We moved here from Cherrybrook in 2003 and have witnessed the huge increase in traffic since then. It’s atrocious, particularly during the school pickup/dropoff times. Weekends are becoming even worse. There have been accidents and other police incidents. At many times of the day, the traffic along Galston Road to the intersection with Old Northern Road is banked back for hundreds of metres.
Often, to be able to get to Round Corner and beyond, we try to turn north along Old Northern Road and use back roads to find our way south. We save quite an amount of time by doing so. We’ve also learned that a lot of traffic from Annangrove and Kellyville comes the back way along Annangrove Road to Round Corner to avoid more direct, but heavily trafficked southern routes. That only compounds the problem on New Line Road.
The state government promised years ago to widen New Line Road to two lanes in either direction. We are yet to see the fulfillment of that promise. What we have tried to impress on them, and both local government councils that intersect our area, is that there also needs to be two lanes in both directions on Old Northern Road NORTH of the McDonalds roundabout and up to the Dural VIllage Shops. That would alleviate a huge amount of pressure during peak times. To this point, no such commitment has been made.
Now to the “new problem”, viz. the large redevelopment of Dural Village, just approved by the Hills Shire Council. The village is located at the same intersection near our home. Yes, council sought various changes to the plan, which have been duly incorporated. But NOTHING has been done by the state government and Roads and Maritime Services to widen Old Northern Road to accommodate the great increase in traffic that will surely occur with the enlargement of the shopping centre. If we have gridlock now at various times of the day, Old Northern Road and Galston Roads will be a massive parking lot once the village redevelopment is completed.
It often seems to us as if one level of government decisionmaking (council) does not communicate with the other level of government (state authorities) when decisions are being made. It should have been made a condition of the approval of the Dural VIllage redevelopment that the main road was widened all the way from Dural Village, south along Old Northern and New Line Roads, to Castle Hill Road at West Pennant Hills.
As stated above, compounding the issue is that we are on the extremities of the boundaries of two councils, the Hills Shire and Hornsby councils. We feel their neglect! The roads are poor, there are missing footpaths on Galston Road and the area (meaning the council land, not the housing) is quite rundown.
Although Dooral Roundup may not wish to be too political, something must be said and done to persuade two levels of government to address these problems.
