LATE RFI Attachment 5 - Advice from Traffic and Transport Plus

                                              Oct Traffic Report
14.   Appendix A shows that there is the ability of 10× cars plus 2× cars with caravans to queue whilst waiting at the
      car washing facilities. The prospect of queuing onto the street is very minimal to non existent and would not be
      expected to occur routinely if at all. Washing your car is something of a discretionary activity (unlike refuelling
      your car, or grocery shopping, for example) that is generally not urgent. As such, few drivers would see the
      utility in queuing on the road to enter a carwash that they know is open 24 hours and can be returned to at a
      later time and date when it is less busy. I consider it unlikely that even the 2× queued vehicles per manual
      wash bay provided would be necessary as it contemplates that a driver would be willing to sit and wait not just
      for an existing bay user to finish washing their car, but a further driver to enter the manual wash bay and start
      washing their car.
15.   The key issue related to the proposed development therefore is to consider the safety of vehicles (and users)
      associated with the subject site and surrounding road network.
16.   I note that no access is sought directly to or from Elm Street (the major SCR fronting the subject site) — the
      removal of the existing crossover is an advantage of the proposal and will have a significant positive safety
      impact by decluttering the Elm Street frontage and ensuring that this section of Elm Street is only accessed
      from dedicated roads.
17.   The existing intersections with Elm Street which are sought to be utilised are:
             a. Elm Street / Opal Street intersection: Ingress is only sought via Opal Street. Vehicles are able to
                prop in the rightmost northbound lane of Elm Street in order to undertake a right turn into Opal Street.
                The rightmost northbound lane is dedicated to facilitating right turns into Cedar Street, Opal Street,
                Diamond Lane and Diamond Street, with vehicles that wish to pass a vehicle propped in the rightmost
                lane able to travel past in the leftmost lane.
             b. Elm Street / Diamond Lane intersection: Egress is only sought via Diamond Lane. Drivers of vehicles
                egressing the subject site are able to prop within Diamond Lane and enjoy adequate sight lines to
                the south when undertaking a right turn. I note that Diamond Lane is already routinely used by
                vehicles egressing the Wessels Petroleum service station. In consideration of the posted speed limit,
                the sight line between vehicles exiting Diamond Lane onto Elm Street and southbound through traffic
                on Elm Street is adequate. The sight line related to vehicles turning left from Diamond Street to Elm
                Street (east→south) via the slip lane requires a sight line where drivers have to look through the
                Wessels Petroleum service station. A search of DTMR’s crash database shows no casualty crashes
                the location of the Elm Street / Diamond Lane intersection over a 20 year period — indicating that
                the sight line between vehicles turning left from Diamond Street onto Elm Street and vehicles
                departing Diamond Lane is not an existing safety issue. This is likely due to the slow speeds of
                vehicles undertaking the Diamond Street → Elm Street left turn and the high level of visibility to
                vehicles departing Diamond Lane. Notably, this sight line to the north from Diamond Lane is a
                relevant consideration, irrespective of whether a vehicle travelling onto Elm Street from
                Diamond Lane is turning left or right. At its absolute busiest, the proposed carwash will generate in
                the order of 34 egressing vehicles per hour, the Equivalent of a vehicle every 1¾ minutes. The
                typical weekday design generation we have utilised (19 egressing vehicles per hour) would have the
                equivalent of a vehicle more than every 3 minutes. The nature of the carwash site itself means such
                departures from the site will be metered by the car washing facilities, and it will be difficult for a
                significant ‘platoon’ of egressing vehicles to arrive at once. As previously noted, the maximum use
                of the carwash (Saturdays) is not expected to coincide with the peak times of Elm Street (which occur
                during the week). As such, there would be expected to be sufficient gaps in traffic during peak on-
                road times for the egressing traffic associated with the site to enter the Elm Street traffic stream
                without large queues propagating on Diamond Lane.
18.   Diamond Lane will be widened between Elm Street and the proposed development’s Diamond Lane access to
      permit 2-lane, 2-way movement. This means traffic headed eastbound on Diamond Lane will not be impacted
      by vehicles egressing the subject site.




      20221115_10608_TTPlusReport.docx



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