Northern Highway (Victoria)

Northern Highway is a rural highway in northern Victoria, linking Echuca on the banks of the Murray River with Beveridge a short distance north of the northern suburban fringes of Melbourne. In conjunction with McIvor Highway, it provides an important link between Melbourne and Bendigo. It forms a significant freight route providing access to markets and ports in Melbourne and the rural primary production areas of the Murray Valley and southern New South Wales, and serves a number of agricultural and tourism-related industries along its length.

Route
Northern Highway commences at the state border with New South Wales as a continuation of Cobb Highway into Victoria and heads in a southerly direction as a two-lane, single carriageway rural highway through the western part of the regional town of Echuca, running concurrent with Murray Valley Highway for a short period, before continuing south through flat open country through Rochester, Elmore and Heathcote, then traverses moderately hilly terrain through Kilmore and Wallan, before eventually terminating at the interchange with Hume Freeway a short distance south of Wallan in Beveridge.

History
The passing of the Country Roads Act of 1912 through the Parliament of Victoria provided for the establishment of the Country Roads Board (later VicRoads) and their ability to declare Main Roads, taking responsibility for the management, construction and care of the state's major roads from local municipalities. Kilmore-Heathcote(-Bendigo) Road was declared a Main Road, from Kilmore to Pyalong on 30 November 1914, and from Pyalong and Heathcote (and continuing west to Bendigo) on 28 May 1915; Heathcote-Elmore Road was declared a Main Road, between Tooleen and Elmore on 17 March 1915, and between Heathcote and Tooleen on 28 May 1915; and Bendigo-Echuca Road between north-eastern Bendigo and Elmore was declared a Main Road on 17 May 1915.

The passing of the Highways and Vehicles Act of 1924 provided for the declaration of State Highways, roads two-thirds financed by the State government through the Country Roads Board. Northern Highway was declared a State Highway on 1 July 1925, cobbled from a collection of roads from Bendigo through Elmore and Rochester to Echuca (for a total of 55 miles), subsuming the original declaration of Bendigo-Echuca Road. In the 1947/48 financial year, its southern end was rerouted south of Elmore: instead of running to Bendigo, it was extended further south via Heathcote to meet Hume Highway at Kilmore, subsuming the original declarations of Heathcote-Elmore Road and Kilmore-Heathcote-Bendigo Road as Main Roads; the previous alignment of Northern Highway from Elmore to Bendigo was subsumed into Midland Highway. Northern Highway was extended south one last time when the Kilmore bypass was opened in 1976, from Kilmore to Beveridge (just south of Wallan) along the former alignment of Hume Highway.

Northern Highway was later signed National Route 75 in 1955; with Victoria's conversion to the newer alphanumeric system in the late 1990s, this was updated to route B75.

The passing of the Road Management Act 2004 granted the responsibility of overall management and development of Victoria's major arterial roads to VicRoads: in 2022, VicRoads re-declared this road as Northern Highway (Arterial #6540), beginning in Echuca and ending in Beveridge.

Attractions

 * Heathcote-Graytown National Park