Fremantle traffic alert: Bridge shutdown sparks warning and new app to track traffic jams

An app has been launched so commuters bracing for chaos when the Fremantle traffic bridge closes in February will know just how late it will make them to their destination.

Transport Minister Rita Saffioti said the closure for up to 12 months is “essential” as she announced measures to help locals plan around it including a live traffic app to provide real-time updates.

“We recognise it will have an impact on the local road network and people’s travel times,” she said.

“The State Government has been working extensively over 18 months to ensure stakeholders and the community are aware of the upcoming closure and how they can best move around the road network during this time.

“We have developed a suite of measures to encourage peak time road users to consider alternative ways to travel on public transport and are rolling out smart traffic monitoring technology to provide real-time updates on traffic and congestion.”

Pocket guides will be distributed to more than 40,000 residences in Fremantle, before the traffic bridge closes on February 1, for construction of a new $430 million bridge that will have two traffic lanes in each direction.

But Greens MP Brad Pettit said the replacement buses and extra train services were nowhere near enough.

“At the moment, we’re only literally got two extra trains running during peak,” he said.

“That’s their solution to 24,000 vehicles a day, it’s not sufficient. This is actually really poor government planning.”

A petition signed by more than 1600 people was tabled in Parliament, and backed by the Greens and Liberal MP Sandra Brewer, calling for urgent safety improvements to instead encourage walking and cycling — before, during and after the closure.

“Raising the barrier, lighting, way finding signage, which would be on the footpath, so you know where you’re going. Those are very basic things,” Fremantle Bicycle Users Group spokesman Jean-Paul Horne said.

“Right now, once you get up to the old bridge, there’s nowhere for you to go on a bike. You have to go back cross, go down, cross again. It’s completely dark.

“When that bridge closes, that trip that I’m going to take is going to get a lot worse, because, currently at night, there’s no lights.

“Those line markings, are all old. They could be redone. They could be done with colour.”