Beaches Link and Gore Hill Freeway Connection

To Whom It May Concern, I live on Kirkwood Street and have recently discovered the government's plan to input a new tunnel, which in turn will release a disgusting amount of nitrous oxide into the air via smoke stacks (leading to a plethora of respiratory diseases) and abolition of valuable environmental spaces. This will have a significant impact on the threatened species of native flora and fauna. Specifically species of Eastern Pygmy-possums and Grey-headed Flying-foxes will be forced to relocate or forced to suffer through harsh construction noises as their habitat continues to be destroyed - with Manly Dam and Middle harbour suffering contaminated water run off, threatening the seagrass and marine species with pollution and contaminated sediment. I am a 17 year old who is abhorred with the treatment of the area that I take pride to call my Home. Not only will this affect future generations to come, but will also inhibit the time taken to drive to my future University due to heavy traffic in the very near future. This operation is a complete hindrance to nature, the suburbs and OUR physical health, which is why I need you to take heed in my words to create a better future by stopping the sickening industrial procedure planned to happen. I request that the smoke exhaust stacks be filtered and the NB Project not go ahead.
Regards,
A concerned resident

Brook Street Naremburn / Flat Rock Creek construction site is noted as a major contributor to tunneling from the south with hundreds of additional vehicle movement as a significant impact (apart for the obvious destruction of bushland and digging into a toxic waste dump) yet once again the basic reality of this location has not be assessed and the mitiagtion of risk explored.

At a recent virtual community session, the question of the impact of the Naremburn Ambulance Station at 18 Slade Street (with no traffic lights) whose closest access road is Brook Street (due to the closed in nature of this location due to the Warringah Fwy & Willoughby Roads) being close by but not easily an option being included in the 'thoroughly long' EIS.

The question was given an obvious pause and no confience given that this fact was well known. As a resident near the Warringah Fwy who also walks around Cammeray, a siren from an Ambulance with lights & sirens on is a regular occurence, so how will these essential emergency services workers safely and with the current ability to get to a patient be impacted by so many more vehicles on their nearest cross street and access to other locations be impacted, are they to get the attention of a series of large trucks to pull to the side and let them pass as they traverse what is a hilly and high risk area already for them to do their job?

Where is the obvious risk mitigation assesment in thousands of pages in this EIS and perhaps there are other similar scenarios just like this one?

I strongly object to the building of the Tunnel and the Beaches Link road in particular as it will have a disastrous impact on the surrounding wildlife and ecosystems, pose a dangerous health risk for our community and create increased traffic, congestion and overpopulation issues for the entire Northern Beaches. The Northern Beaches community has come out in force time and time again to show that they are NOT in support of the building of the tunnel and Beaches Link and it is so disapointing that the state government is not listening to the local communities concerns.

The lengthy construction period of the Beaches Link and the Tunnel will have a disastrous impact on the local area. Increased conjestion, pollution, noise disturbances are just a few of the issues that will be faced by the thousands living in the affected area.

My beautiful family home, which we have owned for over 25 years overlooks the lushous greenspace that is Balgowlah Golf course. The Environmental assessment has declared that our home is in the 15metre buffer zone but has not given us any indication what impact this could have in our home. The lives of our children, our neighbours, our kids in the nearby preschools, primary schools and high schools are all at risk of the unfiltered exhaust stacks built only metres from where we are expected to work, rest and play. What a sad day it is when our government, who has been democratically chosen to be the progressive, forward thinking Nation it thinks it is will ignore all scientific research and best practices to place an unfiltered, cancerous eyesore only metres from our homes and schools. Even Gladys once said she would not build unfiltered stacks in our communities...

The impact that Beaches Link will have on our local ecosystem is unimaginable. So many species are at risk including native birds, fying foxes, bat's, etc who have every right as we do to not have their home destroyed and lives turned upside down. Nearly all the trees that surround my family home have been marked as being likely to be cut down to make way for our new view of the sports field car park and unfiltered stack and service building. And to think we used to grumble about golfers teeing off at 6am! Keep the golf course. Don't take away what little green space we have left. It's insulting to think the government would expect us to take our kids to a sporting match right next to an unfiltered exhaust stack and a busy multi-laned road.

The building of the Beaches Link road is completely unnecessary. Numerous alternatives have been offered to the government by our fantastic community supporters such as the Viable Transport Solutions team and it is such a disappointment that their ideas plus those of the rest of us who have submitted alternatives are simply not being heard and addressed. Building a tunnel to encourage even more cars on the road is not the answer to solve a congestion issue. We should be looking at environmentally friendly ways of Decreasing cars on our roads instead - using railways, better public transport, increased bus routes etc would be a better solution, not this. We should be looking at finding ways to have a positive impact on the environment, one which doesn't pose significant impacts on the lives of the human beings and animals that live in the vicinity. 7 plus years of construction hell all to save 14 minutes off a trip to the city. No thanks. I'd rather sit in traffic on the Spit bridge and look out over the beautiful surrounds and take that extra 14 minutes to be grateful that I get to live on this earth in one of the most parts of the planet.

One can only hope that the government will see sense that this project is a complete waste of time and money. The people of Balgowlah and surrounding areas do not support this travisty. We should not have to subject our children and ourselves to increased health and safety risks. Mental health issues in particular are already being dramatically increased due to the stress this project is having on our lives. My Mum relies solely on the rent that she makes on her house to fund her living costs in her retirement which will no doubt be dramatically impacted by the threat of a decade of construction. My younger sister is serverely disabled and won't ever be able to return to our family home if this project goes ahead as the risks posed to her health would be too severe. All that's left is the faith we must put in our government to come to the logical decision to stop this disaster from happening. And if they don't we will sure as hell do all we can to put a government in power that will put the needs of the community first. The Northern Beaches community does not need a tunnel. We do not want our homes destroyed and lives shattered. We do not want to be lied to by the government time and time again. We do not want Dee Why, Manly Vale and all other suburbs on the beaches turning into high rise mini cities. There is already a shortage of housing and jobs here, we cannot sustain the anticipated population growth that this tunnel would generate. For the sake of our children's future, let's work together as a community to come up with a better solution to make a better Sydney. Tunnels, more roads and increased cars is not the solution. Destroying our already sparce greenspaces is not the solution. Killing our children with poisonous fumes is NOT THE SOLUTION! Wake up NSW government. Listen to the community. Read the scientific facts. Put in place best practices. Be the inspiring, trusting leaders YOU promised you would be. There might just be some hope left for us all yet...

I object to the project because a lot of public money will be spent to provide very little benefit and yet it will be detrimental to lifestyle. There will be negative effects to lifestyle and amenity particularly around Balgowlah where a new slip road is to be built to link to the tunnel. The road will go through Balgowlah golf course and spoil the green space amenity. The ventilation from the tunnel will pump polluted air over homes and schools negatively affecting the lifestyles of the residents and school children.
I object in particular to the slip road across the Balgowlah Golf Course because it does not seem to be necessary and is therefore a waste of money. If the tunnel goes ahead drivers from Collaroy northwards would use the Wakehurst Parkway to access the tunnel. Those from Beacon Hill and Narraweena would use Warringah Road and Wakehurst Parkway. That would substantially reduce the number of cars reaching the Spit Bidge. So those drivers from the Manly and Balgowlah and Clontarf area could simply go across the Spit Bridge and probably would anyway even if the slip road to the tunnel via Balgowlah Golf Course were to be built. Those preferring to use the tunnel could access it via existing roads to Frenchs Forest Road. Thus the slip road through the golf course is a waste of money and yet it would severely and negatively affect the area and the green space available.
I object to the over-all plan for a tunnel. Your own data that is provided in Chapter 3 in order to justify the project I found staggering and to me the data justifies increasing public transport and not providing more roads and tunnels. What amazed me about the data for Spit Bridge was the high number of bus passengers. Estimating that 69,500 vehicles take 100,000 people (based on most cars and utes having only the driver) and that buses take 34,000, then that means that roughly a quarter of the total travel by bus and yet there are so few buses compared to other vehicles. What if you could persuade more people to use public transport. If you double the number using buses you could reduce the other vehicles to 45,000 (rough estimate). This could be achieved by, for example, if you limited drivers to using their cars only on alternate days and catching the bus instead as they do in eg Milan.
I don't feel that the tunnel scheme is a plan that looks to the future. In the future more people may work from home as advancing technology will enhance the already exisiting ability to do this. The use of driverless vehicles could lead to cheaper and hence more attractive public transport or more options for car pooling. I feel there should be a greater use of public transport in a plan that is to provide for 40 years or so into the future. There will be a greater population nearing the critical mass that is needed to make public transport work efficiently . It would be better to focus on increasing public transport. Providing more roads and tunnels simply increases the use and number of cars until all the roads again become choked with traffic. This is bad for carbon emissions and hence bad for the climate. Even with electric cars using green energy the use of resources is increased in comparison with public transport usage.

Within Appendix V on page 48 there is a picture of mature trees lining the boundary of Cammeray Golf Course and the Warringah Fwy looking south, what a pretty scene.

The reality of this historical location shot is the irony of the fact that these mature trees were slaughtered en mass to facilitate the creation of the Bus Layover just south of Miller Street in 2009 which included a toilet for bus drivers to 'park' due to congestion on the M2 which impeded their ability to run to timetable and to make way for a cycleway (lopping of low branches was never explored).

Funny how history repeats itself, with these replacement native trees now facing mass removal (as are thousands elsewhere such as at Manly Dam) for another essential project, how ignorant are we to the history of these sites and how we have moved on with mass transit via metro rail as heavy rail isn't as affordable? Where is the objective assesment of what is really the best option not just another short sighted expensive project to benefit a few....paid for by us all!

I object to the Beaches Link Project as I believe that it is unneccessary, not value for money and totally detrimental to the Lower North Shore [LNS] esp the suburbs of North Sydney and Cammeray as well as Naremburn. It is a huge waste of tax payer monies as well as an unhealthy and unwarranted infrastructure project. It will wreak havoc in our local areas on the LNS as well permanently and create a massive increase in traffic disgorging on our local roads daily at a frightening pace. The heinous damage to our Harbour floor is completely unacceptable of any government, I urge the Planners to impose strict conditions on the Project.

I OBJECT to this Project.
I am against the removal of the Bus stops for locals at Cammeray and North Sydney which will have a serious impact on the elderly who will be required to walk further . My understanding is that bus stops like the major one at Falcon/Miller, Rosalind/Miller, etc etc will be removed for the duration of the Project to make way for construction vehicles etc, I object to this disruption in our lives for so many years.

I object to the removal of so many established trees and the detrimental impact on our flora and Green Spaces at Cammeray, North Sydney, Middle Harbour, Naremburn.
The impact of these Works is far too great to be ignored in such a cavalier manner as the Project and the associated EIS has done to date.
The destruction and desecration of our precious Green Spaces must be addressed and mitigated at all costs

I OBJECT to the lack f filtration of the Exhaust Stack at Ernest st which is in effect a triple Stack ...and no amount of spin can take away from the fact that the lack of filtration is an established danger to me, my community, the sensitive receptors like my APPS kids, and the elderlies in my community.

I am opposed to the whole project - I believe that current knowledge, based on the evidence of previous motorway projects and their impact demonstrates the folly of ignoring public transport options when planning to address congestion in the urban context.

Secondly, I am concerned about works in/on Flat Rock Gully. I am aware of the history of this site having been a Councillor on WCC 1992-2012. Our Council, supported by the local community turned a tip site into a local beauty spot, returning the valley to an approximation of its former self - a haven for indigenous flora and fauna. I am simply gob smacked that authorities can think it preferable to locate a work site on revegetated tip face instead of the baseball diamond. Apart from the work site itself, I believe that the risk of contamination both during the construction and subsequent to it is unacceptable to the thinking community and I can only appeal to the sensible amongst decision makers to stop any further work on this project. Because of inaction on climate change, we know that extreme weather events are occurring and can be expected to continue - flooding in this location is unavoidable. Maintaining soil stability should be a priority.

It is simply dreadful to argue that because a site is revegetated, that it is ok to trash the work of those who have sought to remedy a lack of foresight in the past. Revegetation is an environmental good, discounting progress in this way is reprehensible, showing again, a lack of foresight.

I am a father of two, living near the corner of Brook St and Merremburn Avenue, and I see absolutely no benefit in the Beaches Link and Gore Hill Freeway Connection that is being planned. In fact, I feel very strongly that this project will bring nothing but pain and disaster to my family and my community. it is nothing more than a ploy for back pocket padding by NSW government officials making deals with Trans Urban in compensation for lack of revenue from other failed tunnels around Sydney. In particular my key objections are:

1. There was and is no consideration for a mass public transit alternative. Sydney is Australia's largest city, and it is time that it got a mass public transport system to bring it into the 21st century like other major cities in the world. Looking at Montreal, Canada as an example, approximately the same size, geography and population of Sydney, it has an incredibly efficient metro system. What the Northern Beaches need is a way for people without cars to travel - the new metro should extend to the Northern Beaches, this is so obvious with the number of families, young people and green-conscious residents living there and this idea builds on an already established transport project, the new northern metro line, which for some reason stops at Chatswood.

2. Severe reduction in the quality of life for communities at both ends of the tunnel - the noise pollution and air pollution during and after the construction phase will mean that the communities - such as mine - are going to lose their quality of life. We already have double paned windows due to Brook Street traffic today. WIll you be be adding a third layer of windows to our home? The air pollution due to the unfiltered stacks will cause a layer of black dust over our outdoor furniture, plants and laundry. Enjoying outdoor life - which is part of the Australian ethos - will become an endangerment to our health, not the booster to our health that it should be. That is unacceptable. There is at least a dozen schools within 1 km of the proposed stacks, and they will all be put at risk for asthma, lung cancer and other respitory diseases. It is absolutely the worst place to put this on/off ramps. These should be placed further north where there are very few schools, most definitely NOT the lower north shore. Additionally - With the proposed entry/exit points in Cammeray and North Sydney, there will be more traffic coming into our neighbourhood in order to access the on/off ramp on Brook Street, not less and this means that there is no benefit for our neighbourhood- it does not reduce traffic, it increases traffic. Our local traffic will be unbearable - even if you didn't just cut all those bus routes. Cutting the quality of life through noise and air pollution and the constant vibration of the traffic in the tunnel means that we won't be able to get a return on investment of our home. Will you be compensating us for the loss of future earnings on our home? What about the damage that will surely occur due to destabilisation and the ongoing effects of air pollution? What measures are you taking to ensure our quality of life and the value of our home?

3. There was and is no business case - I have already stated how the Northern Beaches need transport solutions that do not require cars. They need more buses, trains and metros. The B-line buses have been successful in proving that public transport is well received on the Northern Beaches. They only group of people whom I've heard are going to benefit from this construction are the odd tradies who can't carry their tools on public transportation. To this, I say, not enough of the population are tradies travelling to the Northern Beaches to justify this massive cost! Are they commissioning the NBL? Because that is the only way this project makes sense. And in fact, there could be a business case made that the tradespeople living on the Northern Beaches will lose their livelihood if you ease the commute of tradies from other areas, making small businesses suffer on the Northern Beaches.

4. Massive cost overruns - without a business case demonstrating cost-benefit analysis and with all the flaws of the current proposal - some of which I've listed above - there is no way that this project will come in on budget. In fact, like other tunnel projects, it will likely be overbudget by billions of dollars. There simply aren't enough tradies to collect the tolls from to make this project profitable. Moreover this project must not have a toll guarantee by the NSW gov like the one it provided for Westconnex - whereby not meeting a certain quota of tolls, the government needed to hand tax payer dollars over to Trans Urban. Clearly there is not enough demand if that is the case. Why in the world would you make another deal like that? Not with tax payer money. If you want to get the trades guilds to pay for it, great. But don't privatise the buses so that you can raise capital for this heavily flawed plan.

5. There will be class action lawsuits - collapsed homes, health issues of children and residents, stress caused by the noise, financial hardship caused by the loss in home value, destruction of the delicate ecosystem that is Flat Rock Gully, the spillage of toxic waste in the waterways ... all of these things and more will not only demonstrate what a terrible idea this is, but also add to the cost overruns that are inevitable on this losing project.

In sum, just... don't.

And while you're at it, return the buses to be back on line - the ones you cancelled over the school holidays like the 343 and the 267, in an attempt to drive more people to take to their cars and ultimately push up the car traffic to justify the tunnels ... and to justify the planned sale of the public bus system. That is so incredibly short-sighted and anti-climate it is unbelievable. If we're going to invest in infrastructure, make it it green.

Thank you for your attention.

The Northern Beaches requires a transport solution. The Beaches Link only addresses a small part of the problem (AM weekday traffic), and exascerbates traffic PM peak and all weekend. The EIS ignores completely the impact of the Beaches Link on Balgowlah Boys High School, the impact on our natural environment, the impact on local streets and impact on our children's health. So much community sacrifice to save a few minutes in the car. The Tunnel is not the long term solution to the Northern Beaches transport problems. Please see attached submission for more detail.

The EIS trivialises what would be significant hydrological and ecological impacts on Burnt Bridge Creek. The Creek would essentially function as a storm water channel.

It is destroying passive recreational bush land which has taken years to establish.
It is going to cause damage to the harbour waters nearby.
It is going to bring pollution from car exhausts.
It is not going to solve traffic problems in the long term.
It is going to disrupt traffic flow now.
It is going to destroy the ecological nature of the area.
It is likely that there will be a car park and/or more playing fields put in instead of restoring the bush.

Submission to the Beaches Link and Gore Hill Freeway Connection Environmental Impact Statement

The following submission is made on behalf of the members of Willoughby South Progress Association. It is within our Association’s boundaries that the Flat Rock Gully access decline is located.

In summary the Association objects to findings of the Beaches Link and Gore Hill Freeway Connection Environmental Impact Statement (December 2020) for the following reasons:

1. Business Case: No business case has been released, separate from the Western Harbour Tunnel project. Without a separate business case, the scope of the Northern Beaches Link Tunnel (NBLT) is such that the community is not able to assess the financial advantage of this separate major project.

2. Traffic Density: No account appears to have been taken of the effect of the Covid pandemic on future traffic density. It is commonly understood that many businesses will continue to operate, at least partially on a “working from home” basis leading to a permanent reduction in peak traffic loading on each of the Peninsula traffic feeder roads. This brings into question the need for the NBLT. We recommend that the timing of the build program be put back a minimum of two years in order to assess the actual effect of the Covid pandemic and thus whether the business case will support the cost of this infrastructure. The business case will likely be set further back by the introduction of the planned express B-line bus service from Dee Why to Chatswood in conjunction with the completion of the Sydney Metro South.

3. Environmental Considerations: The location of the tunnel construction decline at the top of Flat Rock Gully (FRG) threatens a 25 year effort by Willoughby Council (WCC) to create a bushland reserve on what was, for many years, a council land fill site. This bushland section provides habitat for a wide range of native animals, invertebrates and birds and has been classified by WCC as an Environmental Conservation Zone exactly so that disturbance as threatened by the tunnel construction, cannot occur. This section of FRG also is an important link in the wildlife corridor between the Lane Cove River and Middle Harbour. These corridors are vital in maintaining native animal populations which are in the process of decline across Sydney. We can’t afford to lose this part of the corridor.
Further, polluted water flows originating from the disturbed ground of the remediated land fill tip that was once in FRG, both due to leachate and flood water flows, is not dealt with in sufficient detail in the EIS. This threat which affects both the Tunks Park playing fields, and even more seriously, the waters of Middle Harbour, poses a major environmental threat of the FRG decline works. Whether due to climate change or not, we have experienced two one-in-a-hundred-year rainstorms in the past three years and video evidence of the effect on Flat Rock creek is compelling and leads us to the conclusion that far more detail; needs to be provided in the EIS as to how these events will not lead to serious downstream pollution.

4. End of Construction: The EIS is non-committal regarding subsequent use of the decline site following completion of the project. The environmental importance of the FRG bushland cannot be overstated therefore it is essential that the FRG dive site be returned to bushland and not be used to expand sporting facilities as has been suggested by interested parties. The general community, who would benefit from the return to bushland with its walking paths and space for quiet enjoyment, is far greater in number than those represented by the various sporting bodies using the Willoughby Bicentennial facilities. This is the more so in view of the major residential developments occurring on the nearby Channel 9 site, along Willoughby Rd and in Walter St.

I am a resident of the Northern Beaches and strongly opposed to the Beaches Link and Gore Hill Freeway Connection.

I am not opposed to a transport tunnel as such and believe that we need transport solutions for the Northern Beaches. The best transport solution will be a train tunnel that carries a metro line. That will be a solution that meets the needs of the future by not increasing traffic volumes in the city and by reducing pollution. The government has not adequately explored the possibilities of building a viable metro line since there are easy solutions available. These should be fully explored before committing to a road tunnel.

The Beaches Link road tunnel is too large. It is six lanes wide and can carry an enormous volume of traffic. The problem with this is it demands commensurately wide roads leading into the tunnel. These feeder roads will carve wide rivers of traffic which connects distant suburbs together but divides close suburbs from each other. The use of major arterial roads as a traffic solution has been tried in Moscow and Beijing where these problems have significantly impacted on the lifestyle of residents. The Beaches Link threatens to recreate Moscow on Middle Harbour.

A smaller road tunnel which scatters traffic throughout the Northern Beaches work better to keep the integrity of suburbs together. Scattering traffic is done by taking drivers to where they want to go rather than dropping them on major transport arteries and having them fight with all the other traffic as they travel extra distance to their destination. Arterial roads on the Northern Beaches will only lead to congestion and a decline in the quality of life.

The tunnel has a number of design flaws. Its steepness is a major problem and one that has not been adequately mitigated against. The design has very steep slopes towards and away from Middle Harbour. These will cause traffic travelling downhill to use their brakes all the way down then as soon as they start up the other side, all traffic will hit the accelerator hard, creating a massive cloud of pollution on the uphill slope. Cars and trucks will be fighting to overtake each other at 80km/h with slower vehicles that are unable to climb the hill so well being woven between. This will make the drive a very unpleasant experience.

There are no side tunnels to turn off the Beaches Link along the whole length of the tunnel. If there were some exits at Northbridge, Cremorne, Mosman and Balmoral, it will not only bring benefit to residents living in these suburbs and reduce traffic along Military Road, but will also reduce the traffic load for the Northern Beaches by letting anyone who accidentally enters the tunnel get off as soon as possible. There will be lots of these people every day. I know because I have been caught in tunnels around Sydney that I never wanted to enter and when I share my experience, everyone says the same has happened to them.

All the entrances and exits to the Beaches Link tunnel have been poorly designed.

Referring to Figures 4.2, 4.3, 4.5 and 4.6 of Appendix V and Figures 5.1 and 5.17 of Chapter 5, the entrance to the tunnel from Warringah Freeway and the Western Harbour Tunnel is particularly badly designed. There is only one point that you can enter the Beaches Link and that is at Ernest St/Anzac Park, no matter whether you are coming from the Harbour Bridge/Harbour Tunnel or Western Harbour Tunnel.

There are two different streams to enter the Beaches Link depending on which direction you access it but both of these enter the Beaches Link at exactly the same place at Ernest St/Anzac Park. This means that if you miss this one entrance, you cannot get onto the Beaches Link by simply changing lanes. You have to turn off the Warringah Freeway entirely. You then need to do some slick turning around in the side streets to get yourself back onto Warringah Freeway going in the right direction and to the right place in order to get back to the entrance at Ernest St/Anzac Park or the one at Artarmon on the Gore Hill Freeway. This could be fixed simply by having more exits and entrances along the route in Northbridge, Cremorne, Mosman and Balmoral, so that if you miss one entrance, you simply travel in the right direction to the next.

Compare the Beaches Link entrance design with the multiple entrances to the two highways on the Harbour Bridge and the Harbour Tunnel. As you travel south down Gore Hill Freeway and Warringah Freeway towards the CBD, if you are in the wrong lane or miss the turnoff, there are multiple places further down that you can turn to correct your mistake. It gives people lots of choice and lots of opportunities to correct mistakes. That is the freedom drivers need. No one is perfect when driving, particularly on such a complicated stretch of road, but we don’t want to be punished for our mistakes. We want things to be relaxed and easy and this means that the design has to take into account the fact that drivers cannot be paying attention to turnoffs all the time that they are juggling speeding traffic and big trucks. Mistakes are going to happen and the road must be designed to take this into account.

Warringah Freeway will be widened where the Beaches Tunnel starts at Ernest St/Anzac Park to around 25 lanes. That is too wide. There are jokes on the internet about roads in China that are 100 lanes there. That’s only 4 times the width of this one. A road that is 25 lanes wide is obviously poorly designed and when you look into what is happening, it is obvious that there is no need for it to be so wide.

The reason for having so many lanes is that each lane has a single function. It might be the lane that enters the Beaches Link from the Western Harbour Tunnel or the lane that enters Beaches Link from the Harbour Bridge, or the lane that goes from the Harbour Bridge to the Gore Hill Freeway. This is not a smart way to design a road. Instead of having a lane that does one thing and nothing else, all the lanes should be as multipurpose as possible. For an understanding of how this works, just look at how previous generations have designed the Harbour Bridge and lead onto it. The lanes are so multipurpose that they are not even dedicated to going one direction but switch during the day as the primary direction of traffic changes. 25 lanes is more than 3 times as wide as the Harbour Bridge. It is more than 1.5 times wider than the Harbour Bridge, Harbour Tunnel and Western Harbour Tunnel added together – that’s all the roads that lead to that point. It is crazy wide. You don’t need it so wide. You need to go back to the drawing board and see how you can design it better.

To make your 25 lane wide road requires that you destroy part of Cammeray Golf Course. It looks like the designers just could not be bothered designing more efficiently simply because there is free land to be sacrificed to the road project. This land might come to the project for free but it is valuable. Cementing over a golf course is simply turning one of the heat and pollution controlling areas close to the city centre into a heat and pollution producing area. At such an enormous size, it will also further distance residents of Crows Nest from those in Cammeray, so will create social issues as well as environmental issues. But all these issues are totally unnecessary. What needs to happen is you need to come out with a better design.

There is a further design flaw with the entrance to the tunnel at Ernest St/Anzac Park and that is with flooding. The EIS tells us that floodwater will collect at Anzac Park, reaching a maximum height of seven metres. This water will be held back from the road by the sound barrier. This is an unbelievably dangerous solution.

18.4.3 States: “The depth of ponding in ANZAC Park would occur to a maximum of 2.1 metres and 3.5 metres during a 10% and 1% AEP event, respectively, which is sufficient to result in hazardous flooding conditions to persons and property.

“Floodwaters that collect in ANZAC Park would pond against the noise wall that runs along the western side of the Warringah Freeway to a maximum depth of about three metres during a 1% AEP event. If the noise wall were to fail under this weight of water, then floodwater would inundate the Miller Street off-ramp to a maximum depth of about two metres and extend across the northbound carriageways of the freeway….

“Floodwaters that collect in ANZAC Park would build up to a level that overtops the noise wall that is located along the western side of the Warringah Freeway, where it would pond across the full width of the freeway before surcharging across its eastern side and into Cammeray Golf Course.
ANZAC Park would be inundated to a maximum depth of seven metres, while the carriageways of the Warringah Freeway would be inundated over a length of about 350 metres and to a maximum depth of five metres.”

This modelling assumes:

1. That a sound barrier is an appropriate dam wall.

2. That the failure of the sound barrier when acting as a dam for a wall of water 2.1m, 3.5m and 7m high will cause water to slowly move forward, resulting in no damage other than flooding.

Sound barricades are not an effective material to make a dam wall. They could easily fail and this will cause a tsunami of water seven metres high to flow from Anzac Park into the entrance to the Beaches Link and Western Harbour Tunnel, killing everyone in it for kilometres in each direction and potentially killing people and causing massive economic destruction in surrounding suburbs.

See attached for full submission.

I am writing to voice my concerns regarding the proposed Beaches Link Tunnel and its impacts on our community, our school and the local environment.
Michaela Utesena
Below I have outlined our key concerns in relation to this project :

Revisiting the tunnel justification

Concern - The figures put forward in the EIS indicate only a minimal reduction in the traffic flowing through Mosman for a significant and disproportionate use of public funds

We feel that many of the assumptions for traffic used as justification of the build in the EIS have not factored in changes to travel habits and working from home due to COVID-19 and into the future, treating COVID-19 as having only a “temporary” impact.

Request - There are many new data points to factor in given the impact of COVID-19 on lifestyles long term and we stand with Viable Transport solutions in asking the government to halt the development process to allow for a suitable review, and to publicly release the results of the review.

Construction Impact

Concern - The construction phase of the project will undoubtedly impact North Balgowlah residents with dust, noise, vibration, and heavy vehicle traffic in the area. North Balgowlah will have construction surrounding most of the suburb and the EIS indicates that during construction there will be.

· Over 3,000 vehicles per day across all sites.

· 1,690 vehicles per day at the Balgowlah Golf Course site alone.

· 1.5 heavy vehicles every minute or 4.5 vehicles (total) every minute.

· Over 4,000 homes subjected to excessive noise

· Construction work to proceed 24/7 for up to 7 years.



Request – Reconsider how to ensure that the impact of trucks/vehicles is not felt on the suburban streets that are already hard to navigate with local traffic and buses. Ensure areas around schools and parks are not impacted and are safe for families and children to walk or ride around the local community. Disincentivise commuters looking to use our streets as a rat run to save time from congestion and money from using the toll roads.

Ventilation stacks

Concern - Global health experts agree that pollution from traffic exhaust poses serious health risks. Emissions include nitrous oxides and particulate matter that, when breathed into the lungs, causes respiratory diseases such as asthma and emphysema, and cancer. There are several schools, preschools, childcare centres, and sporting fields within the vicinity of all the proposed ventilation stacks and from a parent's point of view, the increased level of pollution is unacceptable.

Request - If the tunnel were to go ahead that the stacks be equipped with full filtration to minimize these impacts. At the very least the air pollution is kept at the current levels.

Environmental Impact

Concern - We are fortunate to live in an area that incorporates some spectacular bush land, reserves, and beaches and would urge that further consideration is given to the major environmental impacts, including but not limited to:

· Movement of contaminated sediment to Clontarf and Middle Harbour (The Spit) potentially causing pollution of the neighbouring beaches.

· Destruction of Burnt Bridge Creek and surrounds (e.g., bushland, wildlife etc) due to a possible 96% reduction in water flow.

· Discharge of 428,000 L per day of wastewater into Queenscliff Lagoon & Beach, resulting in health hazards for people and animals who swim in the waterways.

· Pollution of Manly Dam reserve, resulting in the potential extinction of rare flora and fauna and the last remaining areas of Duffy’s Forest, and meaning that one of the only swimmable dams in NSW is no longer safe for public use.

· Loss of recreational activities with the mountain bike trails that are used for riding, walking, and running.



Request –We want assurances that future generations get to experience the natural wonders of the area in all its glory. That wildlife can live in the shadows of residential houses, not shadows of construction and pollution.



We understand that in life, it is important to move forward, but not at all costs. For the reasons above , I have strong reservations regarding the tunnel and whether it is the right solution .

The project will completely interfere with our community. Health, traffic and noise concerns.

As Sydney is an aspirational city of the world, it's residents and government would expect that a wide scope of research and assessment of what other cities have already done to be a major impact and logical starting point for this and other projects.

However from the outset in the public domain since 2017, this could have not been further from the reality of this body of work that is now at the EIS stage. As a group and as individuals we the prople have been treated as idiots with dumbed down technical presentations especially on air quality and why filtration of tunnel air has not been an essential outcome, yet our existing toll roads have signs to tell us to close your vehicle windows and turn on your own air conditioning to filter the air yourself!

I have had many explanations of why to and why not to filter an enclosed space for the health of those inside it and outside (who didn't choose to be in that environment such as kids just being at school) and it seems to come down to a very simple conumdrum, filtering is better but what do you do with the hightly toxic and now concentrated particular matter / air not fit for human life?

A big call it is to say that air pollution especially from diesel vehicles of which Sydney like London does can kill and yet in the UK this is now a fact!

Ella a 9yo school girl was killed in part by air pollution, on her death certificate for the first time in the UK and from multiple investigations from her early death, asthma triggered cardiac arrest on 15 February 2013 she died aged 9, previously she had been admitted to hospital 27 times. Why was it found that air pollution made a medical condition that many live with the cause of her untimely death, because her family and honourable people worked on the facts to come to this uncomfortable conclusion of such a contributing factor. Ella lived near a very busy road, walked the school, attended school and in the history of her life it was enough to kill her.

How does this liability compare with a State Significant Infrastructure Project? An uncomfortable extra cost on something already ridiculously expensive, Ella's life a scenario of exposure that in effect will be the same for tens of thousands of kids in the first year of operation, this only gets bigger with not the previous EIS estimated school populations of a few hundred children nearby but tens of thousands with the Nth Syd LGA a massive education precinct and at the other ends, Balgowlah, Seaforth & Frenches Forrest also having schools at these road tunnels let alone the added pollution load to schools elsehwere such as from the Lane Cove Tunnel and other open roadways carrying a higher capacity of vehicles per day on the Warringah Fwy, M2, M5, M8, M1 and the numbers just get bigger.

So is the Project Team really doing it's due dilligence to asses the risk of Air Pollution (along with noise and water) to a standard that will indemnify the know risks and consequences in 2021 of this choice to not filter the air, when is has been argued by the Premier herself that filtration is required in context of the Lane Cove Tunnel built between 2004 - 2007 which at 3.6km long isn't as deep (using more fuel to get in/out) or as long as the proposed?

I worry about that every day and night I spend with my 9yo daughter....living, breathing and going to school in Cammeray.

Within Appendix F Traffic & Transport - pedestrian and cyclist surverys were undertaken, one date quoted being on Thursday 20 July 2017. In a document published in December 2021 the useage of this data should be added to with a much more recent update. Given that COVID has radically changed how often we travel and how we travel this would be part of a worlds best practice? No yet again we gloss over the facts and local reality to stick on script to the toll road only narrative that this project seeks to hide but any living person can question but what about now?

Again don't insult our intelligence, common sense and the fact that this toll project puts it's hand in the public purse without current and factual information at it's core. The irony of Appendix F = Fail also isn't lost on our community!