August 16, 2012

The South Burnett Regional Council will consult 60 property owners on roads straddling the border areas of the old Nanango and Kingaroy shires about making road names more consistent and/or fixing up the properties’ rural addresses.

At its monthly Council meeting on Wednesday, Councillors were told that inconsistencies in road names and rural address numbering were causing confusion to casual users and significant difficulties for emergency services personnel.

The roads and properties in question also failed to comply with Australian Standards relating to rural addressing and road naming.

The affected road names are:

  • Booie Road, defined as running from the Burnett Highway to Kingaroy-Barkers Creek Road
  • Bellbird Road, defined as running from the D’Aguilar Highway to the Kingaroy-Cooyar Road
  • Old Taabinga Road, defined as running from the currently-named Barkers Creek-West Coolabunia Road to Kingaroy-Cooyar Road, and
  • Lucas Road, defined as running from the D’Aguilar Highway to Semgreens Road

Council officers said they wanted to rename and renumber the following roads or road sections to bring them up the Australian Standards:

  • School Road and the small section of Darleys Estate Road between Semgreens Road and Kunioon Road, which would be renamed Kunioon Road, Once this was done, Kunioon Road would be defined as running from Nanango-Brooklands Road to Buttsworth Road
  • Barkers Creek-West Coolabunia Road, which would be renamed as Goodger Gully Road
  • Lucas Road between West Coolabunia Road and Semgreens Road, which would be renamed to form part of West Coolabunia Road
  • Archookoora Road, which would be defined as running from Kingaroy-Cooyar Road to Mustons Road via the forestry access road
  • Old Taabinga Road would include the sections from Archookoora Road to Stuart Valley Drive; Stuart Valley Drive to Stuart River; and Stuart River to the Bunya Highway
  • Coverty Road would be defined as running from Dangore Mountain Road to Underwoods Road
  • Ellesmere North Road would be renamed Ellesmere Road and defined as running from Stuart Valley Drive to the Wengenville-Glencliffe Road
  • Glencliffe Road would be defined as running from the Kumbia-Brooklands Road to Wengenville-Glencliffe Road, and
  • Kumbia-Brooklands Road would be renamed Kumbia Road

Finally, the Council would renumber the following roads:

  • Bellbird Road
  • Booie Road
  • Old Taabinga Road between Barkers Creek-West Coolabunia Road to Kingaroy-Cooyar Road, and
  • Goodger Gully Road, defined as running from Semgreens Road to Nanango Brooklands Road

Council officers said about 60 postal addresses would be affected by the changes and they recommended that Council consider providing up to $50 per residence to assist with costs associated with changing addresses – a total outlay of $3000.

The officers also estimated that up to 50 new road signs would be required, at a total cost of $7500.

However they said the advantages of the renaming and renumbering exercise – if it were carried out – would be a reduction in customer service requests for clarification of property addressing details at Council’s offices; an increased level of safety for residents through logical road names and numbering which would reduce emergency response times; and streamlining of Council’s rating system by only needing one address per property.

Council will now conduct public consultations.