COMMENT: While health, education and jobs featured heavily in this lacklustre election campaign, high speed rail seems to have been virtually dropped from the agenda, Mark Carter writes.
As we wait patiently for the counting that looks like it will never end, my mind has turned once again to the future of high speed rail in Australia, if indeed there is one.
What has in the past given the impression of being a sure fire vote winner, this time around it hardly rated a mention in the campaign.
Although not widely reported The Liberals have come out and said the project is virtually a dead duck. This is a major surprise given that three months ago they were dangling the HSR carrot as a prime example of using value capture to fund major transport infrastructure projects.
As it turned out that this was just a temporary illusion, and in mid-June, major projects minister Paul Fletcher made it clear to The Australian Financial Review’s National Infrastructure Summit that HSR was definitely not part of any Coalition transport agenda.
“The $114bn price tag for a high-speed railway by the previous Labor government is considered by many to be “an optimistically low assessment,” he said.
“If you look at a country like Spain, it’s taken 30 years to get to point as having as many kilometres of track as will be proposed between Brisbane and Melbourne.”
“So, newsflash: There is no commitment by the Turnbull government to that kind of funding. It’s just not a sensible priority.”
Earlier the same day two international speakers at the AFR Summit highlighted the benefits of HSR, especially in regard to regional development.
Sir David Higgins, Chairman of Britain’s HS2 high-speed network planned to link the North and South of the country, highlighted the benefits it will bring to that nation’s unbalanced economy.
“Sixty six of the top 100 FTSE companies are in Greater London, while there are only six north of Birmingham,” he said.
HS2 will link London with Birmingham, Manchester, Sheffield and Leeds, more than halving current journey times.
“HSBC is moving their entire UK headquarters to Birmingham on strength of HS2,” Higgins said.
He emphasised that getting the argument right for the project was a key, with the need to shift the focus from speed to capacity increases, the need to rebalance the national economy and for engagement at a regional level.
“It’s important that as much effort is put into explaining the benefits of the project as in planning and designing it,” he said.
Pierre Izard, chief rail system officer for French operator SNCF, echoed Higgin’s comments and suggested his company would be interested in participating in the development of a HSR network in Australia.
HSR was part of Labor’s election platform, although again it got very little mileage in terms of the overall campaign.
Labor did say that if elected to government it would establish a High Speed Rail Authority, which it had attempted do to back in 2013, to work through a process for gathering international expressions of interest for construction of an East Coast HSR.
The 2013 Phase 2 feasibility study found the project viable, with the Sydney to Melbourne leg expected to return a benefit ration of more than $2 per dollar spent.
In some ways general lack of mention of HSR during the campaign could be seen as a positive at this stage as there have been a number of recent press articles berating the HSR ideal. Even in general railway circles there is a good deal of cynicism surrounding the project.
This combined with a fairly large budget deficit is not going to have politicians rushing to add to the debt pile.
But to just drop the project completely is not only negligent, but arrogant. Paul Fletcher’s jibe at the $114bn price tag somehow being Labor’s legacy is puerile in the extreme, and highlights how short term political propaganda wins out over any semblance of sensible policy making every time.
Note to everyone: One of the reasons this particular vote count is taking so long!
What Fletcher failed to point out to delegates at the AFR Summit, was that the cost of an East Coast HSR would be spread over 30 years – a bit like Spain really, Mr Fletcher.
Construction wouldn’t start for another decade, in 2026, ironically about the same time that HS2 will be completed in the UK.
Fletcher did qualify his comments by saying, “It’s conceivable that in 30, 40, 50 years that the population may make the economics of it less challenging than it is now.”
But is this really the best we can do?
Even if that is the case then surely planning has to start now and not be left on the shelf for another two decades?
I have made the point before that unfortunately too many people insist on living and thinking in the now, rather than the future. It is fatal mistake to underestimate the impact projected population growth will have upon our major cities especially Sydney and Melbourne both expected to be more than bursting at the seams by 2050 – some form of regional expansion to alleviate this looming problem will be required and HSR will be just the tool to do it.
The failure of Australia to have a coherent long term transport plan was a recurring theme at the AFR summit, but unfortunately common sense goes out of the window at election time and we then have to spend the next three years, or in the case of HSR, the next 20 to 30, picking up the pieces.
Inland Rail is far more important to the nation than High Speed Rail could ever hope to be….But we have the Road Transport lobby to deal with – again!
Not just inland rail. The main south also needs realignment and is also more important then a wasteful VHST.
Oh and the hsr returning $2 for every dollar spent is horrendously wrong. The HSR will forever lose money hand over fist. The only way to get a $2 return is to have freight using the line.
Freight being carried on Maglev has been mooted by “MonoRail Australia” amongst others. The containers used to load freight into the belly of jumbo jets can be adapted to fit into a Maglev Carriage. Double stacking of the 12.2m containers of seaborne freight have been mooted for transport via maglev by others.
I like maglev but maglev would still be limited to a route between Sydney and Melbourne. How do you get coal or grain freight onto maglev?
We already have a coherent long term transport plan for intercity travel. It is not taxpayer funded and can get to destinations faster then a train.
Freight involves heavier loading on the track than the load created by passenger trains. This as true for Flanged Steel Wheels on a steel track as it is for the Bogie Frame of a Maglev.
So the decision to carry freight would need to be made at the start.
There was a proposal in Mongolia to carry iron ore to China via Maglev.
Rotem Maglev (South Korea)
“Less Construction and Maintenance Costs.
* even distributed load to the track makes for a light and flexible structure
* no need for noise protection barriers along the railways
* less spare parts an low maintenance/ labout costs due to fewer parts which experience friction and wear.”
The Korean Maglev is driverless passenger train at an Incheon Airport.
I have been a passenge on the Siemens designed Maglev from Pudong Airport in Shanghai China. It was designed to be a passenger train.
The Chuo Shinkansen Magleb line in Japan will have a length of 286Km but so many people as passengers there is no need for them to consider freight as way of raising revenue
Melbourne to Sydney is 900Km. Our smaller number of potential customers makes Freight as a “second source of revenue” for a Maglev an important consideration
I like maglev but it is not the solution because freight isn’t run solely between Sydney and Melbourne. You need to look at everywhere freight rail goes. You also need to look at the fact that every port has a rail line and not a maglev line. Maglev is not viable for freight.
Trains rarely run solely between the two end stations.
When travelling on the Shinkansen between Tokyo and Beppu I got on and off the train at many railway stations between the two end stations. “Passing loops” meant that express trains could pass other trains standing at the local railway stations along the route.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nq9uzbF6QI8
Similarly freight from and to towns along the route, such as Tullamarine Airport, Shepperton, Albury-Wodonga, Wagga, Southern Highlands & the new Airport at Badgery Creek would be served by freight trains. Airfreight containers being trans-shipped at the airports using “passing loops”.
Any reasonable railway line is a dual track with passing lanes at the Railway Stations.
https://faculty.washington.edu/jbs/itrans/dispelling-myths-blow.pdf
The shinkansen in Japan doesn’t have freight trains running on the same line as the 300km/h passenger trains and the same would be the case in Australia if it is run.
Australia isn’t japan or Europe. Outside of the cities there is no significant passenger rail task. There is however a significant freight task which is why a new dual purpose line is needed along the main south.
It needs to be connected into the inland rail and the north east Victoria rail lines being converted to standard guage. This is the rail system we need in Australia and not a $200billion dollar developer white elephant.
Transport Orientated Development (TOD) or value capture is one of the oldest benefits of building railways.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transit-oriented_development.
The builders of the transcontinental railways in USA were given land surrounding the railways, “Land Grants” as part of the incentive to build the railways.
In England the 19th Century railway companies around London built and owned dormitory townships around their railway stations as a means to bring revenue to run their railways.
CONSOLIDATED LAND & RAIL AUSTRALIA is planning to emulate this with the current proposal.
http://www.clara.com.au/
“CLARA conjunctly proposes to build a High Speed Rail (HSR) network between Sydney and Melbourne via Canberra, connecting the proposed inland cities. This will include the construction of stations in each of the eight new cities as well as High Speed Rail platforms being developed for Melbourne, Sydney and Canberra.”
“The eight cities project can deliver critical mass in passenger numbers for the HSR network, as well as unlock the significant financial benefits to the Australian economy of inland city development.”
Except Australia doesn’t need large cities when it doesn’t have the water for people in these new large cities or the farms that grow our export grains, fruits and other produce. What Australia needs is a brand new rail line to make our freight movements more efficient. Not a wasteful silly passenger rail service.
I suggest we need both!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fJwZS_-bgNA
ARTC current solution for the inland fast link between Melbourne – Pakes – Brisbane is re-using the existing :rights-of-way” .
By contrast the National Trunk Rail are proposing a “Shorter Straighter Flatter and Faster” route using a new alignment as a PPP. The Council of Australian Government (COAG) may choose to have ARTC adopt the NTR proposal.
And realignment of the North Coast line plus overcoming the Short North ‘curfew’ too, with the NSFC Stages 2 and 3, Fassifern-Hexham line (Newcastle Bypass), Hexham-Stroud Road-Taree to name a few solutions