Cities minister Jamie Briggs says the Melbourne Metro won’t be “shovel ready” until 2018 or 2019, and until then it won’t be ready for funding from the Federal Government.
Speaking last week with The Conversation’s Michelle Grattan podcast, Briggs said he and Victorian transport minister Jacinta Allan have “had several discussions about Melbourne Metro”.
“It’s not yet at a point where [Victoria is] ready to bring it to the Federal Government although [Allan] assures me it’s not far away,” Briggs said.
“It is still in the design phase.
“It’s a long way from being shovel ready – we’re talking 2018, probably 2019, to be honest – but it’s an important part of how Melbourne will move.”
Briggs stressed while his cities role does represent a new tack for the Coalition, it didn’t mean the Commonwealth would just throw money at projects without a tick of approval from Infrastructure Australia.
“We do need to make decisions which are not based on the politics of the day or the preference of one party over another,” Briggs said.
“We [did] a lot of really good things with our first infrastructure push, but with future infrastructure considerations we should be more broad in what we’re looking to fund, because clearly mass transit was something that the [Infrastructure Australia] audit identified as a big issue in nearly every one of our capital cities, with growth.
“We’ve got to have better planning, and we’ve got to be more long-term in our thinking.”
Briggs’ comments were supported on Tuesday morning by prime minister Malcolm Turnbull.
“I’m yet to see a proposal, the minister is yet to see a proposal, but certainly we don’t discriminate between rail and road, or any other form of transport,” Turnbull told Melbourne’s 3AW Radio.
“I’d be delighted to see a [Metro] proposal, which the premier will no doubt show to us.”
Briggs’ shadow minister Anthony Albanese has called for “commonsense” on the Melbourne Metro project – the goal of which is to build a north/south rail tunnel under the Melbourne CBD, to lift capacity pressure off the surrounding network.
“Having successfully knifed [former prime minister Tony] Abbott from the prime ministership, Mr Turnbull should stop playing on social media and actually fund public transport to boost the productivity, sustainability and liveability of Australian cities,” Albanese said on October 2.
“He can start by talking to Premier Daniel Andrews about partnering to build the Melbourne Metro, which has already been the subject of extensive planning work, funded with $40 million in the 2009 budget.
“It has been endorsed by Infrastructure Australia.”
Whatever it takes to finally get it built. by the time 2018 rolls around start of construction will be 6 years overdue.