New Mulgrave River Bridge to open nine months ahead of schedule

The new $48 million Mulgrave River bridge should be open to traffic by April this year, nine months ahead of schedule, Australian Infrastructure and Transport Minister Minister Anthony Albanese and Queensland Main Roads Minister Warren Pitt announced today.

Mr Albanese and Mr Pitt joined Federal Member for Leichhardt Jim Turnour and Labor Senator for North Queensland Jan McLucas on a visit to the project, where they walked along the deck of the new bridge for the first time.

They also invited the community to attend an open day for the bridge on 5 April, when members of the public would be able to walk across the bridge and inspect progress first-hand.

“Excellent progress is being made to deliver this vital piece of road infrastructure ahead of schedule,” Mr Albanese said.

“The majority of the bridge construction is complete with all deck units now installed, allowing us to walk along the bridge deck for the first time today.

“The focus is now on completing works on the approaches to the bridge, which will allow it to be open to traffic in the coming months,” he said.

Mr Albanese said the new bridge, which will create 390 direct and indirect jobs, was one component of the Australian Government’s $348 million Accelerated Bruce Highway Upgrade Package.

“The new 480m-long bridge is part of our commitment to improve accessibility between Cairns and Townsville.

“This series of works is about improving flood immunity on the Bruce Highway and reducing duration of closures due to wet season flooding.

“Another component of this package, the $178 million Tully River project, was completed before Christmas and has coped extremely well with the monsoonal rains that have fallen in the area in the past month.”

Mr Pitt congratulated the Australian Government on its Nation Building program.

“This has allowed both governments to co-operate on a co-ordinated round of works designed to make the Bruce Highway safer and more flood immune,” he said.

“The new bridge will stand five metres higher than the existing bridge to improve its flood immunity and is located on a better road alignment, about 30 metres upstream from the existing highway.

“The aim of this project is to upgrade the flood immunity to a medium closure time of 48 hours during a 50-year event, with an average annual closure time of less than 10 hours,” he said.

"As a local resident, I have experienced first-hand the inconvenience of highway closures due to wet season flooding.

“The completion of the new bridge will contribute to the ability of the highway to better serve the community in times of flood and help sustain the local economy by limiting disruption.”

Mr Pitt said Main Roads was planning to celebrate the official opening of the bridge with a community day to be held on 5 April.

“There is a definite excitement about the new bridge among the local community and people who regularly travel across the existing one,” he said.

“Main Roads will be inviting people of the Cairns community to join in the celebrations to commemorate the official opening of the bridge and the benefits the new bridge will bring to residents, motorists, the freight sector and industry in the far north.”

Details about the official bridge opening and activities will be provided in the coming weeks.

Media enquiries: Mr Albanese’s Office – Jeff Singleton 0410 476 890

Mr Pitt’s Office – (07) 3227 8819