Roads unit rates benchmarking 2025
- Igor Ivannikov
- 2 days ago
- 3 min read
We are pleased to announce the completion of the 2025 road benchmarking spreadsheet, marking the eighth consecutive year of this initiative since its inception in 2018.
The spreadsheet provides a comprehensive summary of each NSW council's road gross replacement cost per kilometer, compiled using data from NSW councils, the NSW Office of Local Government, and Transport for NSW.
Our goal is to offer a simple yet effective comparative tool to assist councils in evaluating their road network’s replacement costs annually, conducting internal desktop revaluations, or critically reviewing external valuations. We believe this resource is invaluable for benchmarking purposes and will significantly support councils in ensuring the accuracy and integrity of their road network valuations.
This is particularly relevant as, in 2025 financial year, 41 councils — one third of all councils in NSW—undertook road revaluations. Having access to up-to-date benchmarking unit rates will be a valuable tool in analysing and conducting these revaluations effectively, especially for councils who are planning to perform revaluation in 2026 financial year and beyond.
The spreadsheet is available on this link ->> Roads Unit Rates Benchmarking 2025
Some findings are summarised below.
Valuer
In the 2025 financial year, 41 NSW councils conducted comprehensive revaluations of their road assets (an increase from 26 in 2024). Of these, approximately 16 councils carried out the process internally, while the remaining 25 engaged external valuers.
Since the 2018 financial year, councils have adopted different approaches to valuation, with roughly 40 per cent of councils relying on internal expertise and the other 60 per cent utilising external valuers, as illustrated in the list below.
It should be noted though that last year the split was more 50 * 50. That means more councils are moving toward engaging external valuer for comprehensive valuation of transport assets.
Unit Rates
By aggregating all unit rates into groups ($’000/km), some interesting results can be derived.
Overall roads (excluding earthworks)
8 councils reported rates were between $50k to $100k (in 2024: 8). 7 councils had road rates between $100k to $150k (in 2024: 17). About 17 councils applied $150k to $200k rates (in 2024: 20). But most of the councils (about 93) had road rates above $200k per kilometer (in 2024: 80).
Sealed roads
As at 30 June 2025, about 58 councils had the highest unit rates for sealed roads (>$400k per km) which is comparable to the results from 2024 financial year (58 councils). Summary of all councils presented in the graph below.
Unsealed roads
19 councils’ unsealed road rates were within $0k-$50k per one kilometre (in 2024: 23); 20 councils were in the group of $50-$100k per one kilometre (in 2024: 20). The two groups combined comprise one third of all councils. About 15 councils had unsealed roads unit rates above $150k per one kilometer (in 2024: 14). Unfortunately, we could not figure out details for unsealed roads values of about 64 councils which are in a “N/A” group as can be seen in the graph below.
Bulk earthworks
There is some uncertainty about 46 councils which did not disclose value of road earthworks in their financial statements or in Special Schedule 7 (because they were combined with the roads values). From the rest of the group, significant portion (37 councils) used rates below $100k per kilometer (in 2024: 40). However, there are still many councils with the unit rate of more than $200k per kilometre (28 councils). See details in the graph below.
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