Tollway builder named as price tag goes into orbit

Construction of the 40-kilometre tollway, which was announced in June 2000, could start early next year, with WestLink Motorway Ltd announced as preferred tenderer ahead of the Thiess and Baulderstone Hornibrook-backed Orbital Parkway Alliance.

WestLink would meet most of the construction cost if the final contract is awarded. It is likely to be granted a 34-year concession to operate the road as a tollway. Taxpayers will fund $356million of the road through Federal Government support.

A spokesman for the Transport Minister, Carl Scully, said the increase in cons-truction cost of $250 million from previous estimates represented the ``refined cost when [the project was] put to market".

WestLink is financially backed by Transurban Group (40 per cent), Macquarie Infrastructure Group (40 per cent), Leighton Motorway Investments (10 per cent) and Abigroup Ltd (10 per cent), a government spokesman said.

Transurban operates the CityLink tollway in Melbourne, which uses similar electronic tolling technology to be employed on the orbital. The technology allows drivers to pay tolls without stopping.

The toll will be charged in increments, depending on distance travelled, to the maximum of about $5.

Nearly 100 houses will be demolished to make way for the orbital.

It will link the M2, M4 and M5 toll roads and provide the western arc of a ring road around Sydney.

When built in 2007, it will form part of the national highway network, in place of the Cumberland Highway, which is likely to revert to state care.

Mr Scully said a toll would be charged so the road could be built 20 years earlier than if funded solely by the public sector.

The house of the Davis family is one of almost 100 that will make way for the orbital.

The Roads and Traffic Authority has been buying land for the orbital for many years. Land in Blacktown has been set aside since 1968.

After 23 years in their single-storey brick-and-tile house near Blacktown, the Davises received a letter just before Easter that stated they would have to move out to make way for an orbital on-ramp.

``[The money] still doesn't make up for all the heartache, anguish, depression and fears," said Alison Davis, who renovated the house only three years ago with an inheritance from her mother.

Mrs Davis and her husband Gary, a driver for a spare-parts company, settled for $310,000 after negotiating with the RTA, which had initially offered $280,000. They will also receive $18,000 to cover moving expenses.

They will move out at the end of November.

``My advice to others is not to settle for the first price you are offered," she said. ``The bottom line is that it's a raw deal we are the unfortunates."

An RTA spokeswoman said the agency knew the land acquisition process could be difficult and unfamiliar territory for some property owners. ``For this reason, wherever possible, extended periods are allowed for negotiations so that owners do not feel they are being pressured into acceptance of an offer," she said.

Mr Scully said it was likely the final contract would be signed before Christmas, allowing work to begin in the new year.