A new roundabout on Remembrance Drive in Cardigan is a step closer after an application for a heritage permit was submitted.
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The roundabout will replace a dangerous intersection at Madden Road, which has been the site of 10 serious accidents since 2013, including a fatality in 2018.
In 2020, during the court hearing for the driver charged in the fatal accident, Judge Gerard Mullaly stated the current intersection is "notoriously dangerous" - during sentencing, he said "in my view the design of the intersection... made risks outside the control of the driver higher".
Last year, the state government committed $3 million for a roundabout at the intersection.
However, the entire Avenue of Honour along Remembrance Drive, including where the 2018 collision occurred, is in a heritage zone, recognising the significance of the area.
Honouring soldiers who served in World War One, thousands of trees were planted along 22 kilometres from the edge of Ballarat to past Lake Burrumbeet.
Each individual tree recognises a soldier, with their names on brass plaques.
While there have been changes through the years - most notably the highway overpass, which has become a dedicated memorial area - the Avenue of Honour has remained almost unchanged for a century, and is both the longest and earliest example of these memorials in Australia.
The heritage submission goes into detail on this, recommending a "new, compact" roundabout at the Madden Road intersection.
"The proposal presents an opportunity to prevent further road fatalities and near fatalities through the installation of the compact roundabout.," the heritage report states.
"The approach where no action is taken will potentially have dire consequences relating to the loss of human life."
The preliminary design shows a roundabout considerably smaller than the usual standard, about 8.6 metres in diameter, with a concrete apron for trucks and small "speed reduction ramps" at each entrance.
A standard roundabout is about 20m in diameter, and was dismissed as being too disruptive to the heritage value of the area, and would lead to too many trees being removed.
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According to the report, no trees would need to be removed to install the roundabout, and impacts would be "modest", but it's "acknowledged that the cumulative impact of similar works at other intersections along the length of the Avenue will eventually reduce the overall intactness of the place, and the sense of an uninterrupted linear landscape created by the long stretches of uninterrupted road lined by trees".
The report includes renderings, Victoria Police data on crashes in the area, and a full arborists report, but does not include detail on other infrastructure like lighting or signs, or a construction timetable.
The submission is available for public comment on the Heritage Victoria website until January 21.
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