Melbourne’s CityLink toll prices increase again

Melbourne’s over-burdened and under-performing Citylink toll road will again raise its prices from April 1. And this isn’t an April Fool’s gaga…

Light and heavy commercial vehicles will be most severely impacted, with toll road operator Transurban raising the day rate for trucks by 128.2 per cent.

The toll road’s website says the increase, targeting heavy vehicle operators, will help fund the on-going Citylink Tulla Widening Project, a $1.3b scheme adding addition running lanes from Melbourne to Tullamarine Airport. When completed in 2018, the ‘Tulla’ project is hoped to increase capacity of the road by as much as 30 per cent (to 235,000 vehicles per day by 2031) and reduce travel times by up to 30 minutes.

Transurban will slug commercial vehicle operators steeply for the works, the 26,000 truck movements daily are over-represented in the newly-announced toll increase.

Light commercial vehicles, which are billed differently according to the time of day travelled, face a 21.7 per cent jump between the hours of 6:00am and 8:00pm. The charge for a full-distance trip increases from $11.85 to $14.42.

Night rates jump even further with the same trip going from $8.90 to $14.42. This represents a 62 per cent increase.

For heavy commercial vehicles, including large trucks and buses, the price hike is 128.2 per cent from $11.85 to $27.04 for a full-length daytime trip of the toll road. The night rate jumps 102.4 per cent to $18.02 (previously $8.90).

But according to a September 2016 survey by Charting Transport, commercial vehicles make up only a small proportion of the toll road’s patronage. Private cars are estimated to account for more than 820,000 trips per day on Citylink. A further 194,000 cars use Melbourne’s second toll road, Eastlink.

From April 1, 2017 Transurban will lift prices for cars and motorcycles using Citylink by as much as 10 per cent each journey. For example, a trip along the toll road connecting Melbourne’s south-eastern and north-western suburbs increases 1.1 per cent from $8.90 to $9.00 for cars and $4.45 to $4.50 for motorcycles.

The increase amounts to approximately one per cent per toll gantry passed.

It’s estimated patronage of the Citylink toll road has increased three per cent per annum since its opening in August 1999.

The project cost $1.8b to complete.

With tolling not expected to expire until 2034, the road now sports an average speed of less the 20km/h in peak times.

Currently, pricing for Melbourne’s Eastlink toll road (which runs from Ringwood in the city’s north-east to Frankston in the south-east) is unchanged. The next annual change to that corridor is set for a 1.5 per cent rise on July 1, 2017.