While there are plenty of exciting points of interest awaiting city-dwelling grey nomads as they venture into Australia’s historic country areas, one that is rarely discussed is the sheer width of many rural roads.
Compared to the cramped confines of the metropolitan streets of Sydney, Melbourne, Peth, Adelaide or Brisbane, many country towns have simply gigantic roads.
Even taking into account the fact that there is more space to play with in rural areas, the cavernous dimensions of some streets still appear excessively extravagant.
But have you ever asked yourself ‘why’?
The ABC recently carried out an investigation into this very thing and the broadcaster concluded there were several possible reasons. These include:
Like many country towns, Casino in NSW has wide streets. PIC: Destination NSW
In part, the wide roads remain in most country towns simply because there is space to allow it, and because the pace of development meant there was not pressure to encroach on the road reserves.
For grey nomads eager to add the town with the widest street in Australia to the Big Lap ‘to-do list’, the New South Wales town of Trundle is the unofficial wearer of the crown.
“It is 66 yards — or three chains in the old measure — which is the same width as a stock route,” Danielle Ward, licensee of the community’s only pub, told the ABC. “Trundle was a spot where bullock teams used to stop over and that’s why they say it’s so wide you can turn a bullock team around in the main street … you can turn a road train for that matter.”
