FEDERAL Tangney MP Ben Morton has called on a cashed-up McGowan government to build a flyover at the intersection of Stock Road and Leach Highway, even creating his own petition to push the point.

Mr Morton told the Herald it was clear “this is not the government” to finish off Roe Highway, so while Fremantle Port continued to expand something needed to be done about the busy intersection.

“Modelling from Main Roads show that tens of thousands of cars and trucks use this intersection at Stock Road every day,” he wrote on the petition.

“Traffic is only going to increase with Fremantle Port remaining operational well into the future.”

He later told the Herald one of the issues facing the intersection was that cars and trucks were heading downhill approaching it, regardless of which direction they were coming from.

“I know the area well because I live nearby, but I have also had more people saying to me ‘we have had the High Street/Stirling Highway intersection done; this is a problem intersection and it needs to be fixed’,” Mr Morton said.

He also revealed he grew up in a “trucking family” and has his own heavy vehicle licence, although early in his career chose bus driving because he hadn’t quite mastered the tricky truckies’ hitch knot.

Mr Morton has been thrilled by the response to the petition, not just the 2143 it had attracted in a couple of days, but in the comments people have left.

He said they reveal the daily close calls people have had negotiating the intersection amongst the convoys of trucks.

One contributor also suggested a Leach Highway fly-under might work better to accommodate trucks coming off Stock Road, a suggestion he said warranted investigation.

But he says any funding would initially go into the planning and design of a new intersection so a variety of solutions could be explored.

“The design should consider improvements to all traffic movements including trucks using Stock Road and Leach Highway. 

”Planning and engineering designs will need to consider the movement of wide and high loads that occur through this intersection. 

“It could be that a flyover becomes a fly under the intersection – that’s a question to be answered by the engineers once we find them to do the work.

“Those that argue against this project or want to stop it before the planning and design can be done have no desire to find a solution to traffic congestion and safety in the southern suburbs.”

by STEVE GRANT