Old Gold Coast Highway Interchange

[T B]

Hi guys

 

Here’s a pic I found of the old Gold Coast Highway interchange with the Pacific Motorway (then Gaven Way), taken in 1972.

 

According to the Railpage forum the interchange was built around 1962 and lasted 30 years before being reconstructed around 1993. It also prioritised Gaven Way traffic, leaning towards its future role as a bypass of the Gold Coast.

[Paul Rands]

Awesome find :) Such an interesting junction in the middle of what was once nowhere.

 
Paul Rands
paul...@outlook.com

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From: vortec-...@live.com.au
To: aussie-...@googlegroups.com
Subject: [Aussie Highways] Old Gold Coast Highway Interchange
Date: Mon, 11 Feb 2013 17:23:58 +1000

Hi guys

 

Here’s a pic I found of the old Gold Coast Highway interchange with the Pacific Motorway (then Gaven Way), taken in 1972.

 

According to the Railpage forum the interchange was built around 1962 and lasted 30 years before being reconstructed around 1993. It also prioritised Gaven Way traffic, leaning towards its future role as a bypass of the Gold Coast.

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[B. J. Winzer]

Yeah, just what I was thinking too - it's so... rural.

So what's the timeline of progression from the beachfront road to Gold Coast Hwy to Pacific Mwy?� Any visuals like Viseth's done with Princes Hwy?

On 11-Feb-2013 19:27, Paul Rands wrote:

Awesome find :) Such an interesting junction in the middle of what was once nowhere.

�
Paul Rands
paul...@outlook.com

---

From: vortec-...@live.com.au
To: aussie-...@googlegroups.com
Subject: [Aussie Highways] Old Gold Coast Highway Interchange
Date: Mon, 11 Feb 2013 17:23:58 +1000

Hi guys

�

Here�s a pic I found of the old Gold Coast Highway interchange with the Pacific Motorway (then Gaven Way), taken in 1972.

�

According to the Railpage forum the interchange was built around 1962 and lasted 30 years before being reconstructed around 1993. It also prioritised Gaven Way traffic, leaning towards its future role as a bypass of the Gold Coast.

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�
�

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[T B]

I would be very interested to see something like that. Unfortunately I myself know very very little about the progression of the Gaven-Tugun corridor, other than a few odd dates from the 70s and the more recent works.

 

From: B. J. Winzer

Sent: Monday, February 11, 2013 8:06 PM

To: aussie-...@googlegroups.com

Subject: Re: [Aussie Highways] Old Gold Coast Highway Interchange

 

Yeah, just what I was thinking too - it's so... rural.

So what's the timeline of progression from the beachfront road to Gold Coast Hwy to Pacific Mwy?  Any visuals like Viseth's done with Princes Hwy?

On 11-Feb-2013 19:27, Paul Rands wrote:

Awesome find :) Such an interesting junction in the middle of what was once nowhere.

 
Paul Rands
paul...@outlook.com

---

From: vortec-...@live.com.au
To: aussie-...@googlegroups.com
Subject: [Aussie Highways] Old Gold Coast Highway Interchange
Date: Mon, 11 Feb 2013 17:23:58 +1000

Hi guys

 

Here’s a pic I found of the old Gold Coast Highway interchange with the Pacific Motorway (then Gaven Way), taken in 1972.

 

According to the Railpage forum the interchange was built around 1962 and lasted 30 years before being reconstructed around 1993. It also prioritised Gaven Way traffic, leaning towards its future role as a bypass of the Gold Coast.

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[T B]

I do know several dates of the various extensions of the road to create the “Gold Coast bypass”;

 

1960-Gaven Way completed south to Nerang

1979-Nerang Bypass

1976-Nerang to Reedy Creek deviation/reconstruction

1983-Reedy Creek to West Burleigh

1977/1978-West Burleigh to Palm Beach

1985-Palm Beach to Tugun

 

According to Sam the highway was commissioned as NR1 following that last stage, which would’ve been around April/May 1985 I think.

[Sam Laybutt]

B.J. - Tyler's list below is about the best summary I can give you at the moment. No maps yet but perhaps eventually for Ozroads.

The works in 1960 allowed through traffic to bypass Southport/Surfers via Nerang and Nerang-Broadbeach Road. It wasn't a high quality route by any means - essentially a two-lane rural road - but no doubt a welcome relief. The interchange was completed circa 1962 which was a few years after work had started to gradually provide four lanes from the edge of Brisbane to Helensvale, where through traffic split. The interchange was, I suppose, highly desirable given the rural location and high speed traffic on all approaches. A bit like the Federal Highway/Hume Highway interchange which was built quite early on as well. 

The extension from Nerang to Reedy Creek was a fairly high standard single carriageway with at-grade junctions but allowed through traffic to get as far south as Burleigh Heads without using the coastal strip. Prior to this there was a collection of rural roads allowing travel between Nerang and Reedy Creek but I don't think they were anything more than rough unsealed roads. The West Burleigh Road to Palm Beach Avenue section was put in hand very swiftly after the extension to Reedy Creek was nearing completion to allow through traffic to also bypass Burleigh Heads.

The whole thing, still largely single carriageway, was completed to Tugun in 1985. Work then started on duplication not long afterwards, if it hadn't already. 

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From: vortec-...@live.com.au
To: aussie-...@googlegroups.com

Subject: Re: [Aussie Highways] Old Gold Coast Highway Interchange

Date: Mon, 11 Feb 2013 23:45:11 +1000

[T B]

Thanks for that summary Sam, sounds pretty close to what I expected. The duplication (from the best of my knowledge) began at the Gold Coast Highway interchange in the 1980s and headed south gradually. The only solid duplication date I have is for the Reedy Creek to Tugun section, which was finished in May 1997. My memory of road dates I found years back (before I kept lists of stuff I found) is pretty hazy, but I’m pretty sure I read somewhere 1988/89 for the Nerang River/Nerang Bypass duplication.

 

The 1976 date for the Nerang to Reedy Creek section was taken from Queensland Roads by someone from the Railpage forum. I still cannot find even a year for the West Burleigh-Palm Beach section, but I assumed 1977/78 as it was under construction in 1976. The Reedy Creek-West Burleigh section “was sealed with a concrete surface" in February 1983 according to a resource site so I assume it was finished later that year.

[lijman69]

To think that the road heading off to the left was then just a two lane road (Gaven Way) but is now an 8 lane motorway (Pacific Mwy). Quite a change in less than 40 years. I take it there's nothing left of this original interchange now? At least it had a reasonably long life, as opposed to others a bit further north, like at Oxenford & Coomera, which were built in the 1980s only to be obliterated in the 1990s with the upgrade of the Pacific Highway to motorway standard (the M1). The original one at Pimpana still exists, but was made largely redundant when the M1 was realigned at this location. Does anyone know why they decided to do this, rather than upgrade the existing highway?

[Sam Laybutt]

Don't know the answer to that one, sorry lijman. I can only assume it was to cut out a few bends though.

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Date: Tue, 12 Feb 2013 02:45:57 -0800
From: lijm...@y7mail.com
To: aussie-...@googlegroups.com
Subject: [Aussie Highways] Re: Old Gold Coast Highway Interchange

[T B]

The northbound onramp bridge from the Gold Coast Highway seems to be in the same place as the original one, but looks more like a 1980s/90s construction. The southbound offramp is long gone. The four lane work on the Gold Coast Highway undertaken in 1995 would’ve rendered it redundant anyway.

 

The Pimpama interchange was built in November 1994 and is still on the current motorway, however a new southbound offramp was added in 2000. The Mirambeena Drive one (October 1993) appears to be constructed for BOTH new and old highways (wtf). I think the motorway was realigned heavily due to the carriageways being distanced away from each other in many spots (similar to the two sections of highway in NSW near Taree).

 

By the way I thought I’d share some more images, this time from 1981.

 

From: lijman69

Sent: Tuesday, February 12, 2013 8:45 PM

To: aussie-...@googlegroups.com

Subject: [Aussie Highways] Re: Old Gold Coast Highway Interchange

 

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[T B]

Aaaaand a few more! (The first and last ones have no dates)

 

From: T B

Sent: Tuesday, February 12, 2013 8:55 PM

To: aussie-...@googlegroups.com

[Sam Laybutt]

The northbound off-ramp from Gold Coast Highway used to join the old four-lane highway here (thanks Trent):
http://goo.gl/maps/R0JQ0



It was definitely rebuilt as part of the motorway construction.


Mirambeena Drive was the interchange lijman was referring to. I can remember driving this bit in 1999 - there was a temporary lookout off the 1990s Mirambeena Drive interchange which allowed you to look out over the new motorway being built. Trent & I revisited the spot about 5 years ago and it's very different now.


Thanks for the pictures, Tyler, the Coomera and Oxenford ones are particularly interesting as it helps piece together how the road looked as a four-lane road. Oxenford with no suburban development is pretty cool too.

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From: vortec-...@live.com.au
To: aussie-...@googlegroups.com

Subject: Re: [Aussie Highways] Re: Old Gold Coast Highway Interchange
Date: Tue, 12 Feb 2013 20:55:15 +1000

[lijman69]

The bends and grades on the old highway at Pimpana (now called Creek Street) look pretty easy to me - good enough for a 100-110kph motorway IMO. When it was the highway it probably did have a 100kph speed limit. The new M1 isn't much shorter either so it doesn't reduce the distance by much. Maybe there were issues with property access on that stretch or the interchange was substandard and couldn't be upgraded. Those 1980s grade-separations must have all been pretty substandard if they were unable to incorporate them into the 1990s upgrade, a mere decade or so later. I remember travelling from Ballina (NE NSW) to Brisbane by bus in September 1997 when the upgrade was in full swing and seeing one of those 1980s overpasses being demolished (probably the one at Coomera, but I'm not 100% sure). The brief life of those improvements shows that they were not designed for the long term and were hence a waste of money - quite short-sighted on the part of the Qld roads dept.

[T B]

The Oxenford interchange still exists in its 1984 form, but I think that’s the only one now. The Mudgeeraba, Worongary and Robina ones (all between 1987 and 1989) have all recently been reconstructed. Bit similar to the Ipswich Motorway; clearly none of the interchanges were designed for the whopping future expansions the motorways received.

 

I guess they just wanted both carriageways closer to each other to achieve the “world-class motorway” they were aiming for. I am unfortunately not as lucky as everyone else, as I cannot recall what the motorway looked like on my October 1998 and April 1999 trips to Sydney.

 

From: lijman69

Sent: Tuesday, February 12, 2013 9:36 PM

To: aussie-...@googlegroups.com

[lijman69]

So Entertainment Road was the Pacific Highway pre-M1? If so, that explains the length of the pedestrian bridge - long enough to span a four lane divided road.

Google streetview still shows a lookout at the Mirambeena Drive interchange btw, but I don't know how old those images are.

Aevion - love those old aerial shots of the highway pre-M1, especially the one of Coomera before Dreamworld! I wonder if those weighbridges were affected by the inevitable increase in traffic after Dreamworld opened?

[lijman69]

Are you sure? The original interchange was an SPUI? The old overpass would probably have been only two lanes wide but the current one is much wider, to accommodate the SPUI, and in effect forms a tunnel around the motorway. The current overpass is also level but I distinctly remember the original being in the form of a hump, when viewed from the highway.

[Paul Rands]

Nice images. Such a basic road, when you consider what is there now

--

Paul Rands
paul...@gmail.com

<25008nerangriver1981.JPG><25040coomera1981.JPG><25041oxenford1981.JPG><25415mudgeeraba1981.JPG>

[Paul Rands]

What a shit sign assembly on the black and white image! Nice to see some yellow lanterns :)

--

Paul Rands
paul...@gmail.com

<15257nerang.JPG><25009nerang1981.JPG><18363.JPG>

[Sam Laybutt]

The SPUI was definitely built as part of the motorway upgrade. 

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Date: Tue, 12 Feb 2013 04:26:24 -0800
From: lijm...@y7mail.com

To: aussie-...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [Aussie Highways] Re: Old Gold Coast Highway Interchange

[T B]

Whoops, wrong interchange. I meant Ormeau LOL

 

From: Sam Laybutt

Sent: Tuesday, February 12, 2013 10:47 PM

To: aussie highways

[Sam Laybutt]

I believe part of Entertainment Rd (the western service road) was the northbound carriageway pre-motorway upgrade. 


The Mirambeena Drive lookout is here:

http://goo.gl/maps/2XrnR
I do remember visiting it now - just that the view has gone because of the vegetation. 

---

Date: Tue, 12 Feb 2013 03:59:19 -0800
From: lijm...@y7mail.com

To: aussie-...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [Aussie Highways] Re: Old Gold Coast Highway Interchange

[T B]

According to some pre-2000 refidexes there was an overpass at Siganto Drive [then apart of Hope Island Road] (now replaced by a footbridge) and several ramps on either side. I don’t remember ever seeing this one in its original configuration.

[Sam Laybutt]

That's where the old diamond was that Lijman was referring to. The SPUI was built in the present location to replace it. 

---

From: vortec-...@live.com.au

To: aussie-...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [Aussie Highways] Re: Old Gold Coast Highway Interchange

Date: Tue, 12 Feb 2013 22:54:19 +1000

[T B]

Here are two images taken from a Leighton Holdings newsletter from June 1999; second is Mirambeena Drive.

 

According to the newsletter, the east span of the Peachey Road overpass, the northbound bridge over Pimpama River and the Computer Road overpass were removed as part of the project.

 

From: Sam Laybutt

Sent: Tuesday, February 12, 2013 10:56 PM

To: aussie highways

[T B]

After looking at the 1998 Refidex, it appears the northbound onramp bridge from the 1962 interchange remained as part of the 1993 reconstruction, as did the southbound offramp. However they were removed upon the motorway being constructed. Entertainment Road was definitely the northbound carriageway and another carriageway would’ve been right beside it. It also appears the Nerang-Broadbeach Road intersection was already grade-separated prior to the 2000 upgrade.

[davis]

Mostly likely they simply seriously underestimated corridor growth. It applies to NSW too and the level of reconstruction involved at the southern Tugun Bypass tie-in and at Banora Point.

 

 

(More generally it applies to the Gore Hill Freeway or M5 East in Sydney and the South-Eastern Arterial in Melbourne)

[Rob Tilley]

Not sure of the date of the map but it's still in miles

Sent from my iPhone 5 on Telstra NextG

<Untitled1.jpg>

<Untitled2.jpg>

[Sam Laybutt]

Assuming the map is reasonably accurate, I would place it between 1963 and 1967. 

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Subject: Re: [Aussie Highways] Re: Old Gold Coast Highway Interchange

From: yobbor...@gmail.com
Date: Wed, 13 Feb 2013 17:09:16 +1100
To: aussie-...@googlegroups.com

[Paul Rands]

Nice find there Rob. Also nice to see you're still breathing! We haven't seen or heard from you in a while

--
Paul Rands
paul...@gmail.com

[B. J. Winzer]

Underestimation of corridor growth = WESTERN RING ROAD X( X( X(

--

[T B]

Nice map Rob, thanks for posting!

 

It appears that NR1 isn’t shown following either route so that still supports 1985 as the changeover. Gold Coast-Springbrook Road was taking Pacific Highway at the time by the look of it and the road south of there was mostly unsealed to Reedy Creek Road.

 

Funnily enough I had never heard of Merrimac until now............

[Paul Mech]

I remember that last pic very well of the old intersection at Meant before the M1 was put in. Those lights we're still there in December 1996.
T B <vortec-...@live.com.au> wrote:

Aaaaand a few more! (The first and last ones have no dates)

 

From: T B

Sent: Tuesday, February 12, 2013 8:55 PM

To: aussie-...@googlegroups.com

Subject: Re: [Aussie Highways] Re: Old Gold Coast Highway Interchange

 

The northbound onramp bridge from the Gold Coast Highway seems to be in the same place as the original one, but looks more like a 1980s/90s construction. The southbound offramp is long gone. The four lane work on the Gold Coast Highway undertaken in 1995 would’ve rendered it redundant anyway.

 

The Pimpama interchange was built in November 1994 and is still on the current motorway, however a new southbound offramp was added in 2000. The Mirambeena Drive one (October 1993) appears to be constructed for BOTH new and old highways (wtf). I think the motorway was realigned heavily due to the carriageways being distanced away from each other in many spots (similar to the two sections of highway in NSW near Taree).

 

By the way I thought I’d share some more images, this time from 1981.

 

From: lijman69

Sent: Tuesday, February 12, 2013 8:45 PM

To: aussie-...@googlegroups.com

Subject: [Aussie Highways] Re: Old Gold Coast Highway Interchange

 

To think that the road heading off to the left was then just a two lane road (Gaven Way) but is now an 8 lane motorway (Pacific Mwy). Quite a change in less than 40 years. I take it there's nothing left of this original interchange now? At least it had a reasonably long life, as opposed to others a bit further north, like at Oxenford & Coomera, which were built in the 1980s only to be obliterated in the 1990s with the upgrade of the Pacific Highway to motorway standard (the M1). The original one at Pimpana still exists, but was made largely redundant when the M1 was realigned at this location. Does anyone know why they decided to do this, rather than upgrade the existing highway?

 

On Monday, 11 February 2013 18:23:58 UTC+11, Aevion wrote:

Hi guys

 

Here’s a pic I found of the old Gold Coast Highway interchange with the Pacific Motorway (then Gaven Way), taken in 1972.

 

According to the Railpage forum the interchange was built around 1962 and lasted 30 years before being reconstructed around 1993. It also prioritised Gaven Way traffic, leaning towards its future role as a bypass of the Gold Coast.

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[Paul Mech]

Stupid auto correct. That should be Nerang!!

[T B]

I hate auto correct; I’ve sent a few messages to people before and got a reply saying “???”.

 

I personally can’t remember if the lights were there in October 1998, but I THINK they were gone upon my next trip in April 1999.

[T B]

Paul, do you remember if the Pacific Highway (Nerang to Reedy Creek) was four lane standard in 1996??

[Paul Mech]

I think it may have been dual carriageway by then, not 100% on that.

[Vincent Muller]

Based on the model of cars driving through, I would estimate that last photo to be taken around 1992-3.

Sorry I'm a bit late to the party, I've gotten lazy with my emails!

[Rob Tilley]

Found some more old maps with old alignments