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Brumby bungles new rail line plan

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Victorian premier John Brumby announced about $20bn of new transport infrastructure projects last week.

  

But they were all unfunded apart from one, the $4.3bn Regional Rail Link and that fell in a sizeable hole because 24 Footscray residents who would likely lose their houses to the Link, were not told before Brumby made the announcement.
According to a report in The Age, Melbourne University transport academic John Stone, said the chaotic scenes as Footscray residents realised that homes could be bulldozed, following a visit from Channel 9, “was a direct result of the government being so guarded about releasing information.”
He said Vancouver has a well publicised 30-year plan for its transport needs and Swiss railways are similarly well planned. “If they said they needed to bulldoze houses people would say ‘Is there a cheaper way?’”
Already there are half a dozen rail tracks running through and under Footscray. “To say there is no way they can be used is just not credible,” Stone said. When one threatened resident faced with compulsory acquisition, asked transport officials how many trains would run on the new rail line, they didn’t know.
Research by the Victorian Department of Transport in 2007, showed people were prepared to put up with public transport delays if there was a plan, the report said.

 


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