All photos on M80 itself are eastbound. Despite being called the Ring Road, M80 barely makes it around 1/3 of Melbourne's perimeter. Port Phillip Bay interrupts the west end of M80, but the east end feels strongly like half an interchange without a freeway in the middle - except there's nowhere to extend it. There is apparently talk of tunnelling the freeway south to M3, and we know that Australia knows how to construct tolled tunnels, but no movement on that front yet.


"OD8" signifies an "oversize detour" for large vehicles.


Which is it, in a shield or written out? For a little while, VicRoads weren't sure, but the standard is definitively now to be written out. Exit numbers are something else Australia is maddeningly inconsistent about. New freeways tend to get exit numbers, but older stretches between newer ones aren't back-numbered.


The left sign in the 3rd photo is interesting for at least 4 reasons. Exit number, abbreviation of "Melb", overlay of the "EXIT 400 m", and... this isn't SR 43 anymore! It has been redesignated M2, befitting its freeway status. Meanwhile, the last big sign adds an overlay of "To M31 Hume Fwy." I'm not sure if it was a misprint, because the previous sign with the old NH shields (including NH M31 and NH M80) made it to at least 2010.


Here's a now-historical view from SR 43 NB, left and right sides of a single gantry. Nothing fancy here besides the SR 43 shield except the "To OD8" reassurance, which you now know all about from my first caption.


Under SR 35 and a set of railways in Jacana.


We're back to NH M31 again. 2013 was a huge transition year for many Australian states, so I'll let it slide.

Onto M31
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