Article: Doncaster railway line 'could be built for $840m'

[ozbob]

From the Melbourne Age click here!

Doncaster railway line 'could be built for $840m'

Doncaster railway line 'could be built for $840m'

Date July 24, 2012 Adam Carey

A RAILWAY line to Doncaster could be built for $840 million and paid for using taxes raised from the higher property values it would generate, says a report.

The report, jointly written by transport experts from Curtin University in Western Australia, Melbourne's RMIT University, and global engineering firm Arup, has also found that the railway line could transport about 100,000 passengers a day if it was linked to the proposed Melbourne Metro rail tunnel, at an added cost of $300 million.

This is the same number of vehicles projected to use the Baillieu government's proposed east-west road link daily, after it is built at an estimated cost of $5 billion to $9 billion. The report's authors have modelled their cost estimates for the proposed Doncaster railway on the highly successful Mandurah line in south-west Perth, a 70-kilometre railway that was built for $1.3 billion and opened in 2007.

A report co-author, Curtin University's Professor Peter Newman, was the architect of the Mandurah line. He is also on the board of federal advisory group Infrastructure Australia.

The $840 million price tag for the proposed 12-kilometre railway compares with the $498 million cost of extending the Epping line four kilometres to South Morang.

The Mandurah line runs for most of its length along the median of the Kwinana Freeway. It carried 19 million passengers last year, more than it was initially projected to carry by 2020.

The report's authors propose building the Doncaster railway along the median of the Eastern Freeway, as was planned when the road was built in the early 1970s. This route is also one of three options put forward in the state government's $6.5 million Doncaster rail study.

It is proposed to either connect the line by tunnel to the existing rail corridor in Collingwood, or tunnel a further three kilometres to Parkville as part of the $5 billion Melbourne Metro rail tunnel proposal, which would run from South Kensington to South Yarra.

This would cost an extra $300 million but would deliver the most benefit, the report's authors say. ''This new east-west rail project should attract around 100,000 people per day, which is all that the east-west tunnel is planned to take in passenger cars at a cost of between $5 and $9 billion,'' the report states.

''The east-west tunnel may therefore become redundant as it makes little economic sense just for trucks and will cost considerably more than the rail option without providing the same 'value-capture' funding possibilities.'' The ''funding possibilities'' the authors propose are based on a US model called tax increment financing, whereby higher property values boost stamp duty, land tax and local government revenues and help pay for infrastructure projects.

The report found that property values in Brisbane in the past 25 years had risen 23 per cent more in suburbs with high-quality public transport than those without.

It was commissioned by six eastern suburbs councils that form the Doncaster rail local government group and will be handed to them today.

Leigh Harrison, the City of Manningham's acting chief executive, said the council had advocated for years for a heavy rail link to the public transport-starved municipality.

David Ellis, a Manningham city councillor and member of the Eastern Transport Coalition, said the state transport bureaucracy was not interested in the project.

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/doncaster-railway-line-could-be-built-for-840m-20120723-22kpg.html

[colinw]

Doncaster - Melbourne's "Redcliffe Line", certain to re-appear at every election for decades to come.  

[STB]

I vaguely remember an insider at the DoT in Victoria once telling me years ago that the planning didn't add up to a new railway or tram line and that they were looking at boosting bus services to the nearby Box Hill station, mind you this was circa 2006/07.

[SurfRail]

I vaguely remember an insider at the DoT in Victoria once telling me years ago that the planning didn't add up to a new railway or tram line and that they were looking at boosting bus services to the nearby Box Hill station, mind you this was circa 2006/07.

Probably because it was engineered not to make sense.  They do that down there.

There was a large Smartbus package known as DART (Doncaster Area Rapid Transit) which added about 4 BUZ-like routes to replace the previous suite of Eastern Freeway routes, plus there are Smartbus links to Ringwood and Box Hill and several of the other Belgrave/Lilydale line stations.  Even still, that won't cope forever. 

They could do a lot of good by just putting bus lanes on Hoddle Street and Victoria Parade, but apparently that's all too hard and too unfair for motorists...

[ozbob]

From the Melbourne Age click here!

Cost of Doncaster line 'too cheap'

Cost of Doncaster line 'too cheap'

Date July 25, 2012 Adam Care

THE head of the state government-commissioned study into a railway line to Doncaster doubts it could be built for $840 million because of the large amount of tunnelling that would be required.

''My comment to the government was, if somebody's offering to do it for that [price], then sign them up today,'' said study leader Tim Gosbell, senior principal at engineering consultants URS. ''To suggest that any Doncaster rail line option could be built for only $840 million is overlooking the complexities.''

The Age reported yesterday that a report prepared for six eastern suburbs councils says a rail line from Doncaster to Collingwood could be built along the Eastern Freeway median for $840 million. If linked to the proposed Melbourne Metro tunnel, it could take up to 100,000 passengers a day.

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/cost-of-doncaster-line-too-cheap-20120724-22nld.html#ixzz21YpeambB

[ozbob]

Doncaster rail proposal - potential costs   Channel Nine News

[ozbob]

From the Melbourne Age click here!

A rail link we need, and one we don't

A rail link we need, and one we don't

Date July 25, 2012

THE Baillieu government is not lacking in good advice, especially with regard to one of the chief problems it promised to fix on gaining office: Melbourne's creaking, ageing public transport system. Unfortunately, the government shows little inclination to heed the best advice available to it.

As The Age reported yesterday, a report prepared for local authorities in Melbourne's north-eastern suburbs has estimated that a rail line to Doncaster could be built along the Eastern Freeway median strip for $840 million, or nearly $1.2 billion if the line were extended to connect with the planned Melbourne Metro rail tunnel. The extended line could move 100,000 passengers a day - the same number that would be expected to travel in cars along the east-west road tunnel that the government proposes to build connecting the Eastern Freeway and the Western Ring Road. At a cost of at least $5 billion, however, the road tunnel would be much more expensive to build than the rail line, which could be funded by revenue flowing from the higher property values generated by proximity to it.

None of this is wild speculation. The report was prepared by transport consultants from RMIT, Curtin University in Western Australia and the Arup engineering group. One of its co-authors, Curtin's Professor Peter Newman, is a board member of Infrastructure Australia and a designer of Perth's Mandurah rail line, a highly successful extension of that city's rail network that, like the proposed Doncaster line, runs along a freeway median strip. The authors know what they are talking about, and acting on their advice to build the rail line rather than the road tunnel should be a no-brainer. The government, however, is pressing ahead with plans for the tunnel, while awaiting the report of its own $6.5 million feasibility study of a Doncaster rail link.

It is not the only project on which the government should listen to Professor Newman. Last year the government announced that building a rail link to Avalon Airport, owned by trucking entrepreneur Lindsay Fox, would take priority over building one to Melbourne Airport - a decision that, since Melbourne Airport is far busier, made no sense. Last week Infrastructure Australia refused Victoria's request for funding of a study of the $250 million Avalon plan, which Professor Newman rightly described as ''an example of politics overriding rational economic decision-making''. As The Saturday Age has revealed, that is exactly what it is: before the 2010 state election, a rail link was the first of five projects in a wish list submitted to the Coalition by Avalon's management.

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/editorial/a-rail-link-we-need-and-one-we-dont-20120724-22nev.html

[#Metro]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_Manningham

Population 111 000 ... LOL.

BUSWAY!!

[SurfRail]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_Manningham

Population 111 000 ... LOL.

BUSWAY!!

To where?  Big problem once you hit Hoddle Street.

The point has been quite rightly made that a railway can feed into Melbourne Metro at Parkville.  Assuming it has a capacity comparable to Cross River Rail (24+ with the appropriate signalling and safeworking), you could have a train to Doncaster carrying 1,500 people every 5 minutes in peak, which would be virtually at what a busway can carry.  That still leaves room for 12 trains per hour or more to be shared with Sunbury and Melton once both are electrified.

[Gazza]

To where?  Big problem once you hit Hoddle Street.

Indeed, but TT has picked the mode first, without thinking about the issues in the area.