SKY NEWS: RTA to list NSW's 100 busiest roads

[Rice86]

RTA to list NSW's 100 busiest roads
Updated: 22:06, Thursday February 17, 2011

The NSW government has pledged to pinpoint the state's 100 busiest roads and improve them, after a new report found Sydney is one of the worst cities in the world for traffic congestion.

The Roads and Traffic Authority (RTA) will publish travel times on the top 100 roads four times a year, allowing motorists to hold the government accountable.

'What we need to do is get all that information, the missing piece of the jigsaw puzzle is the full travel times that everyone has,' Roads Minister David Borger told reporters in Sydney on Thursday.

'This will provide the information needed for government to fix those accident blackspots, those congestion pinch points.

'With this information, everyone's going to know where the congestion blowouts have been and where we need to direct money to actually fix those problems.'

The state opposition labelled the government's plan to list the top 100 roads as 'bizarre'.

This was something the RTA should be doing 'as a matter of course,' opposition transport spokesman Andrew Stoner told reporters in Sydney.

'This is part of their key role in charter,' he said.

'Why you'd get up after 16 years in power and announce that they're going to do something that they should have been doing all along, it really is quite bizarre.'

The IBM Australian Commuter Pain survey on Thursday ranked Sydney tenth in the world for the most pain experienced by commuters.

It also found 27 per cent of Sydney commuters had at some point turned around and gone home because of bad traffic.

Mr Borger said he felt for those commuters.

'When congestion affects someone, it can ruin your whole day ... it really stresses people out,' he said.

'It is a big issue and one that I'm totally aware of.'

[xero]

will they be able to narrow it down to just 100?