Southern Transport Investment Program

[2] Hobart Disc jockey and resident of Bagdad, Bob Cooke has said locals live in "mortal fear" driving down Constitution Hill - A semi-mountainous stretch of the highway.

[3] In response to some of these concerns, the Midlands Highway at Constitution Hill is being upgraded to have oncoming lanes separated by a wire rope safety fence[4] and is expected to be completed in May 2009.

[8] In 2005 the Federal Minister for Trade Warren Truss said the state government had accepted all funding packages proposed by AusLink for that year except for the replacement of the Bridgewater Bridge.

After this incident and the increasing road fatalities on the existing highway the Derwent Valley, Brighton and the Southern Midlands Council started lobbying the State government for the construction of the long-awaited bypass.

[10] During early April 2007, after a ten-year-old girl was killed on the highway, the Mayors of the 3 southern councils proposed a 10-year upgrade of Hobart's northern approaches ending in the replacement of the Bridgewater Bridge.

[11] Towards the end of April 2007, after five road fatalities on the Highway that month[12] the state government drafted plans for a two-lane bypass of Brighton (built over 10 years).

[15] The day after making these comments the Mr Lennon accused the Federal government of pork-barrelling in the north and north-west while neglecting deadly roads in the south.

I do remind Mr Lennon that 60 per cent of Tasmania's budget is provided by the Commonwealth already.In the following days Prime minister John Howard indicated the state's south would get a boost in road funding.

However, Mr Howard hit back at Premier Paul Lennon's accusations he has spent up big in north and north-west while neglecting road safety in the south of the state.

We have been told by premiers Rundle, Bacon and Lennon that the bridge was the top priority for road works in Tasmania, it was absolutely vital because the current one did not have a long life left.

As well as having a continuous 110 km/h speed limit the new road will also have a centre barrier to stop head-on crashes that have caused numerous deaths and serious injuries on the notorious two-lane stretch of the Midland Highway.

The five-year plan also includes the construction of a $70 million Brighton Transport Hub to replace the road-rail freight transfer centre at the Hobart railyards.