Australia: Brisbane’s Airport Link tunnel opens, tipped to “meet targets” in first 3 toll free months

CcourierMail

AIRPORT Link opened to traffic at 11.55pm on Tuesday, and the operator of Brisbane’s newest toll road has declared it will meet traffic targets within three months despite the troubles that have plagued the Clem7 tunnel.

The nation’s biggest piece of privately funded road infrastructure opened at midnight, with 135,000 vehicles forecast to use it each day, but in the first test of Airport Link during Brisbane’s afternoon peak-hour traffic, heavy congestion was experienced in the northbound tunnel.

Some frustrated commuters turned to social media website Twitter to vent their frustrations, withAnn Lund writing at 6.29pm: “AirportLink was horrendous this evening. Speed 40km, jams everywhere exiting it esp Stafford/Kedron. Won’t be doing that again.”

At 4.40pm City North News reported, “Traffic wall to wall on Stafford Rd on day 1 of #airportlink”, and user Beck commented: ”Great that #airportlink is finally done but they didn’t think much about the short merge lane at the beginning of Stafford Rd”.