Planning Minister Rita Saffioti.
Camera IconPlanning Minister Rita Saffioti. Credit: Supplied/Supplied

New taskforce announced to consider truck usage for Fremantle Port through Cottesloe

Jon BassettWestern Suburbs Weekly

A NEW taskforce announced by the State Government last week will consider whether trucks continue to use Curtin Avenue through Cottesloe.

“I’ll go through all of that. That’s part of the work that has to be done,” Transport Minister Rita Saffioti said, when asked if the northbound trucks would instead use Tonkin Highway.

About 11 per cent of Fremantle Port container trucks use Curtin Avenue where railway land has been mooted for public transport-orientated development.

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Ms Saffioti said there had been many options for Curtin Avenue’s role in the past and she would get further advice on its future, in addition to working with councils to relieve truck traffic.

The taskforce, led by Freight Logistics Council chair Nicole Lockwood, will investigate the location, size and timing of any new port, plan its road and rail links and could have a report ready in two years.

Mr Saffioti said the taskforce was now needed for an “integrated plan” looking at all possibilities, including outer-metropolitan hubs where containers railed from ships were put on trucks for deliveries across Perth.

She said she would wait for its recommendations before possibly capping Fremantle Port containers and indicated the current port’s future had some residential and commercial development potential if a new port is built.

Corporate adviser and Infranomics director Cameron Edwards said Kwinana was the only answer because it had 4000ha of land, and it could “future proof” WA’s trade because of the jobs created by industries in any adjacent business park.

Curtin University professor of sustainability Peter Newman was cautious about the taskforce.

“The minister will have to be very strong and redirect any advice, which in the past has come from the Fremantle Port Authority, that we do not need a second port,” Prof Newman said.

See Opinion page 8