I remember getting my learners and doing my driving test on the first day I was legally able to, had them booked for weeks before too. I have never driven anywhere near your speeds but I liked the old cars and the modern cars are great too with all the comfort. The biggest difference I notice is the quality and improvement of the main highway between Brisbane and Sydney. It used to take for ever on the old pacific highway, slowing down through every small town, struggling to over take anything in my old Toyota corolla. Nowadays its a 110 limit and almost dual highway the whole way cutting hours off any trip. There working on a Coffs Harbour bypass now while will improve it even more.
There's some really great road projects which reduce risk and travelling times, but for each one there's many more that confound logic. I guess they can't fix every problem area but with all the revenue raised from traffic infringements I'd at least expect a few more to be rectified, and rectified far quicker than they are.