Road in Victoria, Australia
(The) Grand Ridge Road is a long tourist drive through Gippsland, in Victoria, Australia. As the name suggests, the road primarily follows ridgelines through the heavily undulating Strzelecki Ranges.
The road is known for the attractive scenery ranging from open farmland to dense forest, especially as it passes through Mount Worth State Park and Tarra Bulga National Park. Its surface ranges from good quality sealed bitumen to heavily corrugated unsealed gravel.
Route
Grand Ridge Road begins at the intersection Korumburra-Warragul Road in Seaview and runs in an easterly direction as a narrow dual-lane, single-carriageway sealed road via Allembee South to eventually meet Strzelecki Highway at Mirboo North, where the road quality improves as a dual-lane single-carriageway rural highway. It continues east as a narrow sealed road just beyond Mirboo, where the road quality degrades further into a single-lane dirt and gravel mountain road as it winds through the eastern Strzelecki Ranges; many sections are quite steep and passing opportunities are usually possible only at road junctions. The road quality improves to a narrow dual-lane sealed road where it meets Tarra Valley Road, and continues east as a sealed road until its eastern terminus at the intersection with Hyland Highway in Willung South.
The unsealed section of the road is heavily used by logging trucks throughout the year. Large trees and branches often fall after high winds. This road is not recommended for caravans.
History
The passing of the Country Roads Act of 1912[4] through the Parliament of Victoria provided for the establishment of the Country Roads Board (later VicRoads) and their ability to declare Main Roads, taking responsibility for the management, construction and care of the state's major roads from local municipalities. Leongatha-Yarragon Road from Leongatha North via Hallston and Allambee to Yarragon, and Warragul-Leongatha Road from Ellinbank via Seaview to Hallston, were declared Main Roads, on 10 November 1913,[2] and Boolarra-Foster Road from Boolarra via Gunyah to Foster was declared a Main Road on 1 December 1913.[5]
The construction of (The) Ridge Road was detailed in the Country Roads Board's annual review for the 1924/25 financial year,[3]running from Seaview, Mirboo, Gunyah, Ryton, through Balook, Blackwarry to Carrajung (for a total of 66 miles, subsuming the original declarations of Warragul-Leongatha Road between Seaview and Hallston, Leongatha-Yarragon Road through Hallston, and Boolarra-Foster Road between Boolarra South and Gunyah, as Main Roads), described to "play an important part in the further development of the hill country of South Gippsland";[3] it was referred to as Grand Ridge Road from 1933.[6]
A section of the road between Wonyip and Albert River was later declared as part of Midland Highway in 1939;[7] this was later incorporated back into Grand Ridge Road when highway status was revoked in 1990.[8][9]
Grand Ridge Road was signed as State Route 190 between Wonyip and Albert River (as part of the Midland Highway) in 1986; despite the revocation of the highway in 1990, this section was still signed as such until the change-over to the new alphanumeric system in the late 1990s, when all traces of the former route were removed. It is today signed as Tourist Route 93 for its entire route; its eastern section between Balook and Willung South is also signed Tourist Route 94 as part of the eastern loop of the Strzelecki Trail.
The passing of the Road Management Act 2004[10] granted the responsibility of overall management and development of Victoria's major arterial roads to VicRoads: in 2004, VicRoads re-declared the road as The Grand Ridge Road (Arterial #4023) between Tarra Valley Road in Balook and Hyland Highway at Willung South;[11] the remaining section of Grand Ridge Road between Seaview and Balook remains undeclared.
Significant intersections
Notes
Sources
