Princes Highway

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The Princes Highway is a segment of Australia's Highway 1 that extends from Sydney to Port Augusta via Melbourne and Adelaide. The Highway roughly follows the coastline between the three cities, and thus takes quite an indirect and lengthy route. By contrast, the National Highway takes the Hume Highway from Sydney to Melbourne, and the Western Highway from Melbourne to Adelaide.

Existing roads were re-named ‘Princes Highway’ after the visit to Australia in 1920 of the Prince of Wales (who became King Edward VIII, thence the late Duke of Windsor). The highway was officially opened on August 10 1920 at Warragul, Victoria.

Princes Highway at Moruya, New South Wales

The Princes Highway starts in the centre of Sydney and heads south through the Illawarra region of New South Wales and the city of Wollongong. It continues south, through the South Coast of New South Wales, passing through Nowra and Batemans Bay finally crossing the border into Victoria south of Eden.

In Victoria the highway passes through the Gippsland region, the Latrobe Valley and continues heading west into Melbourne. It does not continue all the way through Melbourne, becoming Queens Way, which terminates at Kings Way. It begins again in Footscray, stemming from Ballarat Road. While in Melbourne, the eastern section is known as Dandenong Rd and the western as Geelong Road, as it goes towards the now suburb of Dandenong and city of Geelong. However, the Monash Freeway stems from the Princes Freeway in the eastern outskirts of Melbourne and the West Gate Freeway from the Princes Freeway in the western outskirts, and these have been linked together by the southern link of the CityLink tollway.

Leaving Melbourne, and still heading generally west, the highway passes through Geelong, before striking inland toward Warrnambool. This last leg avoids the slower, but very picturesque Great Ocean Road. From Warrnambool, the Princes Highway passes through Portland before crossing the border into South Australia at Mount Gambier.

At Mount Gambier the highway takes a northward tack, passing the most beautiful Coorong National Park. The next leg takes us through Murray Bridge and over the mighty Murray River into Adelaide. It continues on into the semi-desert town of Port Augusta to connect with the Eyre Highway to Perth and the Stuart Highway to Darwin.

Sections of the Princes Highway have been upgraded or superseded by freeways. They are :

Southern Freeway between Sydney and Wollongong
Princes Freeway East between Melbourne and Traralgon
Monash Freeway through Melbourne's east
West Gate Freeway through Melbourne's west
Princes Freeway West between Melbourne and Geelong
South Eastern Freeway between Adelaide and Murray Bridge

Princes Highway

See also