Potholed, washed away: $23b worth of local roads in poor health

The Australian Local Government Association State of the Assets report, to be officially launched in Canberra on Tuesday, reveals that the replacement cost of sealed roads in poor condition, or infrastructure with significant defects, currently runs to $19.2b and unsealed roads, the vast majority in farming and remote communities, $3.9b.

Meanwhile, the three yearly stocktake of council assets reported that while many of the nation's timber bridges no longer meet the requirements of modern transport fleets, 18pc are in poor condition with a replacement bill of $365 million.

It also said the 6pc of concrete bridges in poor condition will cost $1.7b to replace.

ALGA president Linda Scott said local councils almost universally have a "frustrating" story of a road or a bridge washed away and built back to the same standards "just to see it washed away again the next year".

"It is so challenging that $23b of local roads are in poor condition, that $8.3b of council buildings and facilities are in poor condition," she said.

The slight improvement in the last three years, with local government infrastructure in poor condition falling from 10pc to 8pc overall, only highlights the scale of the problem.

The findings would be little surprise for ACM Agri readers struggling with washed-out shoulders, long stretches pockmarked with potholes, hotchpotch patch jobs, poor drainage, reducing speeds instead of repairing problems and fresh repairs crumbling within months.

The Land reported earlier this month that hundreds of kilometres of roads and bridges across regional NSW remain in a "state of disgrace" following flooding in recent years.

In fact, 277 of the nation's 537 councils made an emergency declaration in 2022-23, with 82,000 kms of roads damaged across Victoria, NSW, Queensland and South Australia fracturing connectivity with crucial freight routes and rail links.

Ms Scott said councils are lamenting low funding levels that do not allow for adequate maintenance programs and that most local roads, built years ago, are simply not designed to withstand the intensity and increasing frequency of extreme weather events.

GrainGrowers trade and supply chains policy manager Annabel Mactier said the organisation was "deeply concerned" that the current road funding model is placing "significant pressure" on rural councils.

"A well-maintained road network is vital for the efficient and safe transportation of grain. A damaged or deteriorating network poses genuine safety risks for rural communities," she said.

As potholes deepen and asphalt crumbles, the makeshift roadside white crosses accumulate as the human toll of Commonwealth and state government budgetary decisions are partly blamed for the increasing deaths on regional roads.

Government data shows 1286 people were killed on Australian roads in the 12 months to February 29, a 9.9pc increase year-on-year, while May was the deadliest month for motorcyclists in Victoria in a decade.

The situation was so bad last year that Victoria Police assistant commissioner Glenn Weir said officers were "constantly" pointing out poor road conditions to authorities.

Around 75pc of local councils are in regional, rural, and remote areas compared to 25pc located in urban metropolitan areas.

The State of the Assets report said roads in poor condition can have significant social, safety and productivity implications at a local and national level.

"A poor section of road resulting in delays on an important freight route can have a significant negative impact on local, regional, state and ultimately national productivity," it said.

"At a community and business level poor roads compromise access to goods and services, create bottlenecks for freight and increase risk to road safety generally."

Ms Scott said local government road maintenance is chronically underfunded by $1b a year. The ALGA wants a a new $500 million dedicated fund for community and transport infrastructure, similar to the Local Roads and Community Infrastructure program, created to help address this funding shortfall.

New research, due to be released by ALGA next week, also shows a $1b annual investment in local government roads would increase Australia's GDP by $3.5b per year.

Roads categorised in the report as having poor function are deemed as having limited ability to meet needs, while poor capacity is an asset operating at well below design capacity and displaying significant operational issues.

Both federal and state governments lean on local government to deliver many of their priorities, often with low or even no funding to do so.

Successive federal governments have supported initiatives like the multi-billion Roads to Recovery and Black Spots programs, but the federal roads overall funding envelope simply hasn't kept pace with the combination of increased traffic, general wear and tear and extreme weather damage.

The Municipal Association of Victoria's director of strategic foresight and partnership Kat Panjari said financial pressures were "forcing Victorian councils to make hard decisions about which essential community services to stop delivering".

At grassroots level, the West Wimmera council last week announced a different version of a draft budget it released for public comment in April due to "changes in federal and state government allocations towards regional and rural councils" within the recent federal and state budgets.

In announcing $7.2m for critical infrastructure and roads, mayor Tim Meyer said the council was forced to "remove certain expenses from its previously balanced draft budget" and, as a result, the 2024-25 budget now has a $697,000 deficit "which will be drawn from council's reserves".

"We remain committed to investing in vital community projects and we will continue to try to advocate and push for these projects as much as we can," he said.

And so it goes.

GrainGrowers are witnessing rural councils in grain-growing regions across Australia, such as West Wimmera, face increasingly significant challenges in managing and maintaining extensive road networks due to increasing climate variability, funding challenges due to a low numbers of ratepayers and long-term cost shifting.

"Limited funding often forces regional councils to place temporary speed restrictions or weight limits on local roads," Ms Mactier said.

"These restrictions don't reduce the total freight task, as grain must still be transported from the paddocks. This results in growers having to make more trips in smaller trucks, reducing efficiency and increasing the overall costs of transporting grain."

The organisation, along with groups like the the National Farmers Federation and the Australian Livestock and Rural Transporters Association, is an inaugural member of the Rural Road Alliance.

The landmark coalition of farmers, trucking companies and local councils formed last year to call for an emergency $5.5 billion road funding package to repair broken regional roads.

Meanwhile, the slowly turning knife for councils is that their duties over the past three decades have expanded to include disaster response and recovery, housing and often delivery of aged care, childcare and primary health and social services without significant funding increases.

The other issue is funding is often tied to new projects and doesn't include support for ongoing maintenance, Cr Scott said councils need more untied funding - including through federal Financial Assistance Grants - to be able to sustainably manage its operations and build back assets better.

"Local governments take 2.8pc of the national tax take and yet own a third of the infrastructure and 77pc of the nation's roads," Cr Scott said.

To this end, the ALGA has requested that the federal government increase its allocation of untied assistance grants to 1pc of total Commonwealth tax revenue, or $6b, up from the current 0.5pc, or just over $3b.

The elephant in the middle of every council chamber is how the current federated funding model will cope with the rollout of the nation's energy transition, that government and private investment believes will streak ahead of the broader economy, across regional Australia.

The 2024 ALGA assets report looks at the condition, capacity and function of council assets across a number of different classes including roads, bridges, buildings, parks, stormwater, wastewater, and airports, along with footpaths and cycleways for the first time.