Billion-dollar baby: Orange at the heart of massive road spend

As the year ends, almost $1 billion worth of transport projects are underway (and, in one case, weeks away from finishing) within the Central West.

They range from a petite $12 million price tag to a hefty $232m and will be noticeable to any Orange residents making a trip east or west.

Parkes, on the Newell Highway, is set to join the bypass club.

The first sod was turned on the western bypass of the town just over two years ago and the latest sign of progress at the site was the delivery of concrete girders (from Newcastle) for one of two new bridges being built as part of the project.

The 10.5-kilometre bypass project is worth $187 million, according to the NSW Government, and will remove about 1200 trucks a day from the centre of Parkes.

The aim is for the project to be completed by the end of 2024.

At the sod-turning in November 2021, then-mayor Ken Keith said the Parkes community had come to accept "that we need a bypass", but "what it does mean ... is that we need to promote Parkes as a destination on the Newell Highway".

A new $220 million bridge over the Macquarie River at Dubbo is starting to come together.

Major work got started in March last year on the new bridge, which is part of a realignment of the Newell Highway through Dubbo, and the latest milestone was the placement of the first of more than 100 60-tonne girders, each spanning almost 34 metres, between the vertical pillars.

Transport for NSW regional director west Alistair Lunn said the girders were being placed using a 60-metre crane.

"The installation process will continue well into 2024, and once they've all been placed, concrete can then be poured on top followed by asphalt to complete the bridge deck," he said.

The preferred route for the 660-metre-long bridge was announced back in mid-2017.

Then-NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian was in Dubbo for the announcement, saying that the bridge "will make such a huge difference to the region".

ACM reported in the past a Dubbo Regional Council survey of residents showed a majority of respondents did not want the new bridge.

Just pipping the new Dubbo bridge in terms of a price tag is the duplication of the Great Western Highway at Coxs River Road, Little Hartley.

The $232 million project involves widening and realigning 2.4 kilometres of the highway to make it two lanes in each direction.

Work on the Coxs River Road project (and the duplication of the highway further east at Medlow Bath) was paused in late April as the newly elected state Labor government had a close look at both projects.

When work resumed in May, Transport for NSW regional director west Alistair Lunn announced that the duplicated highway at the Coxs River Road section would have an 80km/hr speed limit, rather than the originally planned 100km/hr.

Regional Transport Minister Jenny Aitchison spoke about the Coxs River Road project when she was in Bathurst recently.

She said it would involve taking the highway around the back rather than in between heritage properties.

"We've looked at the access issues for [Great Western Highway-fronting business] Lolly Bug and making sure that they will still have access there," she said.

"We think that will provide a much better amenity for residents of Little Hartley and Hartley Valley area."

The duplication of the Great Western Highway through Medlow Bath, meanwhile, comes in at $174 million.

Like the Coxs River Road project, the 1.2-kilometre Medlow Bath highway duplication was paused and then restarted earlier this year.

It will include a new pedestrian bridge over the highway.

Both the Medlow Bath and Coxs River Road duplications of the highway are expected to be finished in 2025.

The ribbon was cut on the $73 million upgrade of the Great Western Highway from Kelso to Raglan in the lead-up to Christmas.

Though all lanes on the highway upgrade are now open to traffic, Transport for NSW says crews will remain on-site in coming weeks to put up permanent safety barriers, complete the footpath near the Gold Panner Motor Inn, finalise landscaping and install traffic lights at the intersection with PJ Moodie Memorial Drive.

Major work on the 3.5-kilometre Kelso to Raglan project started in early 2021.

There is also the continuing work on the $50 million safety upgrades on the Mitchell Highway between Bathurst and Orange (the Vittoria East and East Guyong sections were the latest to be completed); the $12 million Mandagery Creek Bridge replacement at Manildra; and the $14.7 million, 1.7-kilometre latest stage of Orange's Southern Feeder Road.

Put together, the projects - from Dubbo to Medlow Bath - are worth a combined $962 million.

As for the future? The proposed tunnel from Little Hartley to Blackheath is dead, but Regional Transport Minister Jenny Aitchison says her government is focusing on "strategic regional integrated transport plans", which will include the Great Western Highway.

"They're plans that will look across the whole of the regional network to make sure that we are creating proper precincts where people are able to move from town to town effectively, efficiently and safely," she said.