Mid-Western Highway

Mid-Western Highway runs generally west–east, roughly aligned along the Lachlan River in New South Wales, then stretching across the Hay Plain, generally towards the south-western corner of New South Wales. The highway is a single carriageway along its entire length, and shares a concurrency with Newell Highway between Marsden and . Following the upgrade of Hume Highway to a dual carriageway along the vast majority of its length in New South Wales, and the declaration of Sturt Highway as a national highway – despite Mid-Western Highway being the most direct route between Sydney and Adelaide – the route via the Hume and Sturt Highways through Wagga Wagga offers motorists a quicker route, despite being approximately longer. The only major river crossing is the Lachlan River at Cowra. ==History==

The passing of the Main Roads Act of 1924 through the Parliament of New South Wales provided for the declaration of Main Roads, roads partially funded by the State government through the Main Roads Board (MRB, later Transport for NSW). Mid-Western Highway was declared (as Main Road No. 6) on 8 August 1928, from the interchange with Great Western Highway and North-Western Highway (today Mitchell Highway) in Bathurst, via Blayney, Cowra, Wyalong, Rankins Springs, Gunbar, Booligal, Oxley, Balranald, Euston, and Wentworth, to the border with South Australia beyond Lake Victoria; to provide for additional declarations of State Highways and Trunk Roads, this was amended to State Highway 6 on 8 April 1929. The highway was rerouted between Gunbar and Balranald to pass through Hay on 24 September 1929. The Department of Main Roads, which had succeeded the MRB in the previous year, proclaimed the portion of the highway between Hay via Euston and Wentworth to the South Australian border to be part of Sturt Highway on 8 August 1933; the highway's western end was truncated at its own junction with Sturt Highway at Hay instead. This was further altered when State Highway 21 (later Cobb Highway) was altered to run through Hay on 12 January 1944; Mid-Western Highway was further truncated to the intersection with State Highway 21 in Hay as a result. Newell Highway was declared a National Highway in 1992, and was re-declared to form one continuous highway on 15 January 1993: as a consequence, Mid-Western Highway was re-declared to run from Hay to West Wyalong, and then from Marsden to Bathurst. The passing of the Roads Act of 1993 updated road classifications and the way they could be declared within New South Wales. Under this act, Mid-Western Highway today retains its declaration as Highway 6, from Hay via Goolgowi and Rankin Springs to the intersection with Newell Highway at West Wyalong, then from the intersection of Newell Highway at Marsden via Grenfell and Cowra to Bathurst. Mid-Western Highway was signed National Route 24 across its entire length in 1955. With the conversion to the newer alphanumeric system in 2013, this was replaced with route A41 between Bathurst and Cowra, and route B64 between Cowra and Hay. ==Major intersections==