Major congestion-busting upgrades to four of Melbourne’s busiest suburban thoroughfares will be kick-started early in the new year as part of a new approach to delivering vital road projects.

Early works will begin from January at Childs Road in Mill Park, Fitzsimons Lane in Eltham and Templestowe, Hallam North Road and Heatherton Road in Endeavour Hills, and Lathams Road in Seaford and Carrum Downs.

Local contractors Ace Infrastructure (Childs Road), BMD Construction (Fitzsimons Lane), Symal Infrastructure (Hallam North and Heatherton Road) and Winslow Infrastructure (Lathams Road) will deliver the projects, with a host of other upgrades in Melbourne and regional Victoria to follow.

As part of a new partnership approach to road building contracts, a 20-strong panel of prequalified contractors has been established to deliver these first projects as well as a $3 billion pipeline of future vital road upgrades.

This will see these major upgrades move from paper to pavement sooner and easier – creating more jobs now and delivering the industry greater certainty into the future.

More projects will go into construction next year, with detailed planning currently underway for upgrades to Craigieburn Road in Craigieburn, Pound Road West and Frankston-Dandenong Road Bridge in Dandenong South, and Golf Links Road in Langwarrin South.

Upgrades to Sunbury Road in Sunbury, Bridge Inn Road in Doreen, Healesville-Koo Wee Rup in Pakenham, Narre Warren-Cranbourne Road in Cranbourne, Epping Road in Epping and a series of bridge rehabilitation projects will follow.

This new partnership approach will also be used to fast-track other vital projects such as Narre Warren North Road in Narre Warren North, South Road in Bentleigh, Barwon Heads Road in Geelong and Princes Highway East at Flynn and Kilmany.

These projects will mean more than 4,500 direct Victorian jobs and will support a further 11,000 jobs within the Victorian economy in industries such as manufacturing, freight and tourism.

Future road upgrades will be progressively awarded to pre-qualified contractors using the new model, with projects awarded based on the contractor’s capability, capacity, past performance and ability to deliver value-for-money solutions.

The move away from public-private partnerships for these projects to this model was developed after extensive industry consultation, gives smaller companies access to more work and helps reduce risks.

The approach is based on the successful Level Crossing Removal Project model and follows refinements made to the North East Link procurement process – that will help improve collaboration with construction partners.