Length:

104 km

Termini:

Northern: Monash Fwy (M1), Endeavour Hills

Southern: The Esplanade, Cowes (Phillip Island)

Suburbs, Towns & Localities Along Route:

Endeavour Hills, Eumemmerring, Hallam, Dandenong South, Lynbrook, Hampton Park, Cranbourne North, Cranbourne, Tooradin, Koo Wee Rup, Lang Lang, Jam Jerrup, Pioneer Bay, The Gurdies, Bass, San Remo, Newhaven, Cape Woolamai and Cowes

Current: M420 B420

Former: M1 A420 1 65 180 181 186 F81

Road Authority Internal Classification: ¹

1310 (Endeavour Hills to Lynbrook)

6510 (Lynbrook to Lang Lang)

6710 (Lang Lang to Bass)

4971 (Bass to Cowes)

General Information:

M420 / B420 connects Melbourne to Phillip Island, which is famous for several tourist attractions including wildlife and motorcycle racing.

The route is a mix of freeway standard, and dual carriageway highway and rural freeway standard plus some rural single carriageway highway in the Phillip Island area.

Prior to construction, the South Gippsland Freeway was for a time noted in street directories as the "Eumemmerring Freeway”. It was a proposed name that was never officially adopted. ²

1948: Bass Hwy declared. ³

21 November 1969: Current Phillip Island Bridge opened to traffic. This bridge replaced the old suspension bridge that was previously near this spot, and was opened by the Country Roads Board. ³

1970: South Gippsland Fwy alignment begins life as a connector road from Monash Fwy (then Mulgrave Fwy) to Princes Hwy at Endeavour Hills near Dandenong.

1970s: Several extensions from Princes Hwy occurred, including extension to Pound Road and again to the Lynbrook area. Other works included the duplication and upgrade of the old alignment of the South Gippsland Highway into the new stretch of the freeway, and a new dual-carriageway alignment of the South Gippsland Highway was constructed approximately a kilometre to the freeway's west. Pound Road was extended a few hundred metres west across a new bridge over the freeway, and Dandenong-bound ramps were constructed. The interchange where the freeway and the old and new alignments of the South Gippsland Highway met Lyndhurst Road (renamed Hastings-Dandenong Road not long afterwards) was reconstructed to allow the freeway to flow further south using an overpass above the realigned South Gippsland Highway.

1980s: Renaming of Mulgrave Fwy south of Eumemmerring Ck renamed South Gippsland Fwy.

1990s: M1 replaces NR1 north of Princes Hwy interchange.

1997: The B420 segment (Phillip Island Road) of the route was initially designated as the B480 quite early on during the MABC planning process - it's shown in the 'Linking Victoria' document. ³

2003: M1 north of Princes Hwy interchange, replaced by M420 with the extension of Monash Freeway.

2006: Upgrade works on Bass Highway from Stanley Road, Grantville to north of McKenzie Road, Corinella, from two lanes to four with a median. ⁴

2007: Introduction of blue line to Phillip Island Road and Bass Highway - this blue line increases the number of lanes available to the traffic exiting the Phillip Island Race Track when major events are held. ⁴