Bigger trucks, night runs: Port's plan to handle doubling traffic draws fury

Sydney Morning Herald

6 days ago

A surge in trucks servicing the Port of Melbourne could undermine touted benefits from the West Gate Tunnel for inner-west residents, according to a scathing council submission that has called the port's 30-year strategy lazy.
The City of Maribyrnong, which takes in suburbs such as Yarraville and Footscray, is acutely affected by heavy trucks and poor air quality largely due to its proximity to Australia's biggest container port. The council declared a health emergency in 2023 following high rates of illness linked to pollution.
Council staff have now published a blistering 29-page submission, which will go before councillors on Tuesday night, objecting to the Port of Melbourne's draft 30-year strategy, a document released in April and revisited every five years.
The port's private operators, which are nine years into a 50-year lease with the Victorian government, predict that the number of six-metre shipping containers it handles each year will more than double to 7.1 million by 2055.
The increase is expected to be mostly on the backs of trucks because ambitions to shift more freight onto trains have failed to take off. The port's most recent forecast, published in 2020, showed the number of trucks visiting the port each weekday could triple to 34,000 by 2050, an increase of about 20,000 a day.
While the port's 2050 strategy named several rail projects as a priority, the latest document instead says that bigger trucks and off-peak pick-ups offer an adequate medium-term solution.
Maribyrnong Council argues that this approach is 'not good enough', and says that more overnight truck trips would mean exploiting local roads and poses a significant health risk to residents.
'The port's encouragement of larger vehicles as a strategy to free up port capacity through the gate using local roads, at an increased rate during nighttime hours, may be acceptable for the port, but has serious implications on those residents who live on the local roads,' the submission says.