Article: Train derailed by buck-passing and vested interests

[ozbob]

From the Melbourne Age click here!

Train derailed by buck-passing and vested interests

Train derailed by buck-passing and vested interests
CLAY LUCAS
June 26, 2010

STEPHEN Smith is piling his luggage into the SkyBus at Melbourne Airport after a 10-hour international journey. Businessman Smith started his trip in Singapore, where a train whisked him in under 30 minutes from the centre of the metropolis to Changi Airport for about $A2.25.

''At this end, I'm getting on to a bus that'll probably get stuck in traffic," says Smith, having handed over his $16 fare.

Smith is one of 25 million people who will use the Tullamarine Freeway this year to get to Melbourne Airport - a complex big enough to have its own postcode but not a railway line.

Next Thursday marks 40 years since Melbourne Airport opened, ushering in a modern age of international jet travel to an increasingly cosmopolitan city.

But thanks to decades of buck-passing and pandering to vested interests by successive state and federal governments, Melbourne - unlike so many other cities of its size and wealth - does not have a railway line to its airport.

Searches of financial records, government contracts and State Library archives, and interviews with aviation industry figures and transport sector chiefs, show how much some groups, including the state government, could stand to lose if a railway line were built. They show:

■ The owners of SkyBus turned over revenue of $28 million and profits of $5 million last financial year - and paid a dividend of $1.1 million to the Brumby government in return for carrying an average of 5500 people a day.

■ Airport travellers are paying at least $2 million a week in cab fares, with up to 7000 taxis a day going to and from the airport.

■ The corporation that runs the airport is expected to earn more than $100 million this financial year in fees from its 22,000 parking spaces.

Now the state government, elected in 1999 promising to build an airport link, appears to have given up, and has tendered for a new study on an airport ''bus rapid transit'' link instead.

Its predecessors didn't plan it this way. In 1963, seven years before the airport had even opened - but four years after the Commonwealth government had bought 5300 hectares of grasslands in then rural Tullamarine - conservative premier Sir Henry Bolte proposed a £2 million railway line through then empty fields near Broadmeadows. The planned rail link was scuttled after Labor joined forces with the Country Party to vote it down in the upper house in 1965.

Prime minister John Gorton opened Melbourne Airport at Tullamarine on July 1, 1970. It replaced Essendon Airport and meant that, for the first time, big international jets could fly directly to Melbourne.

In the 45 years since, there have been six government plans or studies for a railway line.

The biggest, completed by John Cain's Labor government in 1989, said a rail line was needed - but not yet. ''A rail link would become economically viable at patronage levels of approximately 10,000 per day. This is likely to occur around 2010.'' This year, another government study found a rail line was not yet needed.

Transport Minister Martin Pakula maintains that the bus service to Tullamarine - promoted as a 20-minute trip but whose owners concede can take 40 minutes when Tullamarine Freeway is busy - is enough for the future growth of airport travel. He says the airport claims passenger numbers would need to almost double to make a rail line viable. And, in any case, early next year a new service will start running every 15 minutes between the airport and Broadmeadows station.

''A rail link to Melbourne Airport will be looked at again down the track, but we have to prioritise,'' he says.

Pakula notes that Sydney and Brisbane's airport rail lines, both built since 2000, each has problems. Brisbane's Airtrain runs only until 8pm each night, and carries 9 per cent of passengers (about 1.5 million people a year). Sydney's Airport Link, which now carries 11 per cent of passengers (6 million a year), went into receivership soon after opening because of insufficient patronage.

But with Melbourne's population projected to grow to 7 million by 2049, many influential groups say high-speed rail to the airport is needed within a decade. ''A city the size that Melbourne is heading for, it just has to have an airport rail link,'' RACV public policy manager Brian Negus says. ''If you look at road access to the airport, it is obvious the congestion on the Tullamarine is getting untenable. We need to start moving on this.''

The state opposition has made no promise to build a rail line, if elected. But its transport spokesman, Terry Mulder, says Labor's refusal to do so ''ignores the last decade's changes in Melbourne Airport's traffic mix'', with millions of extra budget travellers now visiting. ''High parking, taxi and toll costs make an airport rail link increasingly attractive for passengers and the 12,500-plus airport workforce,'' he says.

That workforce is growing, along with traffic on the Tullamarine Freeway - from 13 million vehicles last year to as high as 16 million by 2013, according to the airport.

In Melbourne, the SkyBus carries 2 million passengers a year, or about 8 per cent. From 6am to 8pm, a bus leaves every 10 minutes, then at regular intervals all night.

SkyBus managing director Simon Cowen expects patronage to double to 4 million by 2013. His family-controlled company made a $5 million profit last financial year, and paid $1.1. million to the government (payments escalate with earnings).

''A lot of people don't care if they get a bus or a train, and that's a reason a bus is a great solution,'' says Cowen, who believes a rail line is not inevitable. ''There has to be more and more capacity in public transport service. It can be a six-carriage train or a monorail.'' Or, he says, it can be a bus line.

The airport's manager is the Australian Pacific Airports Corporation. In 1997 it paid the Howard government $1.3 billion to lease Tullamarine for 50 years.

Last year, the corporation took in $95 million from car parking revenue. Of this, $74 million was profit. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission in March found the average motorist at Melbourne Airport spent $33 on car parking, including long-term parking.

When Melbourne Airport opened in 1970 there were 1500 parking spaces. Today there are 22,300 for travellers and the airport's 12,500 staff. Each space generates an average $4259 a year for the corporation. This financial year, for the first time, the corporation's revenue is likely to exceed $100 million.

Sydney Airport makes 7.8 per cent of its revenue from parking, compared with 20.5 per cent in Melbourne.

Airport chief executive Chris Woodruff argues against an airport rail line until 40 million people a year visit Tullamarine - 15 million more than now.

Woodruff says plenty of cities have built airport rail links only to see them become ''financial basket cases'' bailed out by taxpayers. ''There are many examples of cities around the world of our size and more that do not have rail links to their airport. The last place I worked before coming to Australia was Hungary, Budapest - that did not have a dedicated rail line, and that is a big city.'' A rail link was recently completed from central Budapest to its airport.

Woodruff says the company does not employ lobbyists to push the Brumby government not to build a rail line. Nor, says Woodruff, does it donate. ''We don't make political donations.'' It has, however, donated to Labor previously. A search of records going back a decade shows the corporation gave to state Labor at a time when the government was last considering an airport rail link. In November 2000, it donated $18,000 to the state branch. In January 2002, transport minister Peter Batchelor announced the rail link ''would not be commercially viable for at least 10 years''.

A rail line to the airport, says Woodruff, ''comes down to the economic case and, Christ, there are so many transport priorities in this state, and I'm not sure what one would cost''.

Woodruff is sure of one growing need at the airport: more car parking. ''We will have to expand our long-term car park and our staff car park at some time in the next few years,'' he says.

At Avalon Airport, owned by transport magnate Lindsay Fox, the management wants a rail line - and soon. Avalon is 56 kilometres from Melbourne (Tullamarine is 22 kilometres).

Six months ago, Avalon completed a feasibility study into building a rail spur off the Geelong railway line to Avalon, to provide train transport for its 1 million passengers a year. It would cost $100 million, including rolling stock, to run a train from Southern Cross station, it found. ''It is a no-brainer,'' chief executive Justin Giddings says.

''We are only one kilometre from the Melbourne-Geelong railway track,'' says Giddings, who has run Avalon for 18 months, and before that Essendon Airport for seven years.

''I fly all around the world and I always use the rail lines when I can. You talk about climate change and traffic congestion - it just should be forced upon airports,'' he says.

The state government's Department of Transport is not doing any forcing. This year it completed the Melbourne Airport Transport Requirements Study, which said the Tullamarine Freeway would grind to a halt by 2021 unless action was taken. It did not propose a rail line. The department has now tendered for another study, this time into how it can improve the airport bus.

The airport's master plan now includes a reservation for an airport train line that would travel underground from the southern boundary, emerging in front of the terminal entrance. Land was also set aside in 2005 by the state government for a rail line to the airport, using the Sydenham suburban line and an existing freight link through Albion.

The last big rail extension in Melbourne was the Glen Waverley line in 1930. Last year, the then head of rail planning at the Transport Department, Uday Dube, told The Age the government had effectively not planned or built any new rail services since the City Loop was completed. This meant there was little expertise in government for accurately costing rail extensions.

A critic of this government's performance on public transport - and a campaigner for an airport rail line since the 1980s - is RMIT academic Paul Mees. He says there is nothing scandalous about the corporation and SkyBus arguing against rail to Tullamarine.

''Privatisation of the airport in 1997 means the operator has an obligation to gouge the public for every cent. For them to do things that lose money for their shareholders in order to be nice to the community is breaking the law,'' says Mees. ''Rational people fulfilling their obligation under the Corporations Law would be lobbying the state government not to build an airport rail line.

''What the government wants us all to do is to focus on the private firms, and blame them for acting rationally, rather than blaming the politicians that created this perverse outcome.''

And, Mees argues, the Transport Department will do anything it can to avoid building an airport rail line because it has outsourced and privatised any capacity to plan such a link. ''The biggest and most effective lobby against an airport rail line is the department and the private operators, because they don't want any interruption to the arrangement that allows both of them to do as little as possible.''

It has not been this Labor government alone that is reluctant. Its predecessor under Jeff Kennett built CityLink, and deferred a rail link. Although in 1998 Kennett transport minister Robin Cooper moved to reserve land for a rail line through Broadmeadows, once again nothing happened.

CityLink's contract specifies a passenger rail line to the airport can be built, but if it carries freight, legal action for lost revenue could follow. In 2008, $14 billion worth of air freight was shipped through Melbourne Airport, meaning this too could be a factor dissuading the government.

Melbourne's taxi industry also depends on airport fares, turning over about $2 million in an average week. Industry lobby group the Victorian Taxi Association says rail is not needed. ''It's not necessary. And if the population grows, so does the number of taxi licences,'' the association's David Samuel says. ''We'd always be open to the discussion about a rail line, but it is a very hypothetical situation.''

Last weekend's Labor state conference confirmed just how hypothetical. Activists in the ALP had moved to change the party's policy on public transport to the airport.

Their amendment to the party platform pledged Labor would ''urgently review surface transport access to Melbourne Airport with a view to enhancing greater use of public transport and reducing car dependency for airport customers and workers.'' The change passed. But it had one amendment: the word ''urgently'' was deleted.

[#Metro]

I am almost convinced that there is an anti-transport anti-rail lobby somewhere out there.
Every time any rail proposal is put up, be it Light Rail (think stoplightrailnow.com.au) or heavy rail, they show up!

[Dean Quick]

Almost convinced? The anti rail/light rail lobby has been around for a long time. Trucking, taxi, bus, car, and oil companies have all conspired over many years to wipe out rails importance and leave this country very dependant on the rubber tyre for our transport needs. This article serves to highlight just how powerful these vested interests can be. common sense just isn't that common!!

[#Metro]

SkyBus managing director Simon Cowen expects patronage to double to 4 million by 2013. His family-controlled company made a $5 million profit last financial year, and paid $1.1. million to the government (payments escalate with earnings).

''A lot of people don't care if they get a bus or a train, and that's a reason a bus is a great solution,'' says Cowen, who believes a rail line is not inevitable. ''There has to be more and more capacity in public transport service. It can be a six-carriage train or a monorail.'' Or, he says, it can be a bus line.

What rubbish! As an customer who used this system, it is good, but a train direct from Southern Cross and then Express to the Airport would be faster, more comfortable and have far higher capacity. Even a cheaper express light rail system would do the job. They had me wait in the carpark for their bus, fiddle around with tickets and then have to deal with traffic to get to the Airport.

Not to mention they get a free, subsided freeway and road to drive their vehicles on. 

[ozbob]

From the Melbourne Age click here!

Doyle plea for rail link to airport

Doyle plea for rail link to airport
CLAY LUCAS
June 28, 2010

MELBOURNE would fall behind other international cities unless planning began now on an airport rail link, lord mayor Robert Doyle said yesterday.

His comment comes as the head of Melbourne Airport says the state government is considering widening the Tullamarine Freeway again, from four to six lanes between the Western Ring Road and the airport.

The lord mayor said planning must begin now for a rail link to Melbourne - which has been on and off the city's agenda since first put forward by Sir Robert Menzies in 1963. Otherwise, Melbourne risked gridlock on the Tullamarine Freeway and losing tourism and business opportunities.

''Name another city in the world with our growth projections, our sophistication and our liveability, that does not have a city-to-airport link,'' Cr Doyle said. ''Either we have got it completely right or every other city has got it completely wrong. Would we seriously argue that Dandenong or Box Hill or other designated activity areas should not be connected to the city by rail?''

Long-term car parking now stretches almost two kilometres from the airport terminal. This could not go on forever, he said.

The Tullamarine Freeway has been widened five times since it opened just before Melbourne Airport did. This Thursday marks the airport's 40th anniversary.

Last year, parking at Melbourne Airport generated revenue of $95 million for its owners, Australian Pacific Airports Corporation.

The SkyBus route generated $28 million in revenue for its owners. The state government, which argues there is not enough demand for an airport rail line, received $1.1 million from SkyBus last year for the right to operate the route.

The government early next year will launch a new SmartBus route, going every 15 minutes to and from the airport to Broadmeadows railway station.

Last year, 13 million vehicles visited the airport via the freeway. Of these, 69 per cent were private cars, 17 per cent taxis and 14 per cent buses.

Melbourne Airport chief executive Chris Woodruff said the freeway, which is often heavily congested, varied between two and three lanes from the ring road to the airport.

Mr Woodruff said an airport traffic group, including VicRoads, was ''having conversations'' about widening the road.

It was up to the airport to ''build a logical case'' for widening the Tullamarine Freeway, Mr Woodruff said. ''It has to be a good business case because we compete with lots of suburbs and regions for roads,'' he said.

When the freeway was built over the Moonee Ponds Creek in 1966, it had two lanes in each direction. It now has eight lanes at its widest point.

SkyBus managing director Simon Cowen also said it should be widened. ''The freeway in the different directions changes from four to three to two [lanes], so to keep it at a minimum of three lanes would make a lot of sense.''

The Department of Transport said on Friday that there was not yet market demand for an airport rail link. However, it is studying an improved bus link.

Melbourne Airport had 25 million visitors last year. This is projected to grow by 2027 to between 44 million and 55 million. At least 12,500 people are employed at the airport.

[#Metro]

   what planet are these people on? They have 8 lanes in front of them, clearly failing, and they want more of the same?
Then there is todays mufreight's piece about the inland railway being diverted.

The rubber tyre lobby. Not happy!