The Monash Freeway is a major urban freeway in Victoria, Australia, linking Melbourne's CBD to its south-eastern suburbs and beyond to the Gippsland region. It carries up to 180,000 vehicles per day and is one of Australia's busiest freeways. The entire stretch of the Monash Freeway bears the designation M1.
The freeway is named in honour of General Sir John Monash, an esteemed Australian military commander for the allies during World War I.
History
The Monash Freeway is an amalgamation of two initially separate freeways: the Mulgrave Freeway (initially designated Freeway Route 81) linking Warrigal Road, Chadstone to the Princes Highway in Eumemmerring; and the South Eastern Freeway (initially designated Metropolitan Route 80, then Freeway Route 80) linking Punt Road, Richmond and Toorak Road, Hawthorn East.
Mulgrave Freeway
Plans for a "Mulgrave By-pass Road and Eumemmerring By-pass Road" had been made as far back as 1966, between Warrigal Road in Chadstone and Princes Highway at Eumemmerring. The Country Roads Board started construction in the 1969/70 financial year, with the initial section of road opened to traffic in late 1972 with two names: as Mulgrave Freeway (from Stud Road in Dandenong North to Doveton), and Eumemmerring Freeway (from Doveton to Princes Highway at Eumemmerring); Eumemmerring Freeway was later separated and renamed South Gippsland Freeway in April 1974, and extended further south to Hampton Park in 1976. Through the 1970s and the early 1980s, the Mulgrave Freeway was progressively extended westward to Springvale Road in 1974, Blackburn Road in 1976, Forster Road in 1977, Huntingdale Road in 1979, and finally to Warrigal Road in Chadstone. The Freeway Route 81 designation was removed in 1988, coinciding with the opening of the South Eastern Arterial and its replacement by National Route 1.
At this time the Tullamarine Freeway also carried the Freeway Route 81 shield. This was due to the 1969 Melbourne Transportation Plan having the two freeways linked to each other from around East Malvern (at the Mulgrave Freeway end) and at Flemington (at the Tullamarine Freeway end), sweeping through the St Kilda area. The plan never came to fruition, but the two freeways have since been linked by the West Gate Freeway extension and the CityLink project.
Mulgrave Freeway timeline of construction
1972: Mulgrave and Eumemmerring Freeways, total from Princes Highway, Eumemmerring to Stud Road, Dandenong North, opened by the Governor of Victoria Sir Rohan Delacombe, 21 November 1972, total cost A$6.8mil. 1974: Mulgrave Freeway, extended from Stud Road to Springvale Road, Mulgrave, opened 10 April 1974, costing A$9.3mil. 1976: Extended from Springvale Road to Blackburn Road, Glen Waverley, opened 15 December 1976. 1977: Extended from Blackburn Road to Forster Road, Mount Waverley, opened 5 April 1977 by Minister for Transport, the Hon J A Rafferty (this section, along with the previous section opened in 1976, cost a total of A$13m). 1979: Extended from Forster Road to Huntingdale Road, Oakleigh, with three lanes each direction plus emergency stopping lanes, opened by Minister for Transport, the Hon Rob Maclellan MLA, 12 December 1979, at a cost of $8.7 million. 1981: Extended from Huntingdale Road to Warrigal Road, Malvern, with two lanes each direction plus emergency stopping lanes, opened by Minister for Transport, the Hon Rob Maclellan MLA, 24 June 1981, at a cost of $11 million. ‘Opened one week after the 20th anniversary of the opening of Victoria's first freeway, the Maltby Bypass Road near Werribee, on 16 June 1961'.
South Eastern Freeway
Construction of the initial section of the South Eastern Freeway by the Melbourne and Metropolitan Board of Works had been completed and opened in 1962, connecting Burnley at Burnley Street, through Cremorne via Harcourt Parade, over Punt Road using a new overpass (known as the Morshead Overpass during construction) to end at Anderson Street and the Morell Bridge, with an at-grade intersection with Brunton Avenue and a single-carriageway feeder road to the Swan Street bridge (and Batman Avenue) 800 metres beyond. The freeway was eventually further extended east from Burnley under the MacRobertson Bridge along the Yarra River to Toorak Road in 1970, with a single-carriageway feeder road taking excess traffic to Tooronga Road. The Punt Road overpass and elevated section of road over the Yarra River and Gardiners Creek were designed by Melbourne engineer Bruce Day. Responsibility for the freeway was transferred from the MMBW to the Country Roads Board on 1 July 1974.