Article: Second best not good enough

[ozbob]

From Business Spectator -  TRUCKS, TRAINS AND TRAFFIC  click here!

Second best not good enough

TRUCKS, TRAINS AND TRAFFIC

by Bob Murphy

Posted 11 May 2009 12:38 PM

Second best not good enough

The Australian Rail Track Corporation last week released the results of its first stage study of the proposed Melbourne-Brisbane inland rail line.

The general and even the trade media dutifully parroted the ARTC release but the study, and ARTC's priorities, merit closer examination.

The ARTC has the bit in its teeth on building up coastal rail and is spruiking for more and more federal funding to keep the momentum up. Inland rail is a threat to their vision for coastal rail and must be talked down (for now).

The original $1 billion Melbourne-Sydney-Brisbane coast rail upgrade quite rightly concentrated on signalling, passing loops, bridges and new track on concrete sleepers within the existing alignment. It was long overdue and well executed.

Now ARTC wants another $2 billion to build a freight-only rail track from Sydney to Newcastle to bypass the region's sclerotic passenger rail system.

ARTC has a bit of momentum up on that ambit and now wants yet more money for track realignment through the difficult terrain on the circuitous north coast line.

But each additional major consignment of taxpayer funds to the coastal route weakens the case for inland rail. And ARTC's apparent priorities are vividly reflected in the assumptions and values of the first stage inland rail study.

From a national perspective, is this really where we want to go?

ARTC's original upgrade plan found that passenger rail growth between Newcastle and Sydney would start cutting into the performance advantage bestowed by the original coastal route upgrade from about 2019.

That is why inland rail was touted as a solution and would be ready by about 2019.

No matter how much is spent on the coastal route, it will never allow double stacking of containers because of the overhead wire system for Sydney's suburban train network and it will always have to traverse the nations biggest rail black hole.

The notion that the coastal route will have a significant impact on Sydney-Brisbane rail share is laughable. The distance is too short. It's just not worth trucking the containers to the rail terminal.

The big growth market for rail in Australia is Melbourne-Brisbane because of the distance and because Brisbane will be bigger than Sydney in 30 years or less.

The potential long distance superiority of rail on the Melbourne-Brisbane run can only be realised with double-stacked containers and high speed sustained running and that isn't going to happen via Sydney and the circuitous north coast route.

ARTC's preliminary choice of route for inland rail is the low cost option which gives a 28 hour running time, almost no advantage over the coastal route (except perhaps in reliability for avoiding Sydney).

The original inland rail concept touted 22 hours Melbourne-Brisbane, a distinct improvement over anything practically achievable on the coast route.

Skimming through the hundreds of pages of the study I saw little concern about train operators per se.

The study concluded that it wasn't worth spending more money for a faster route because time wouldn't bring more business.

But for a train operator cycle times (to maximise train utilisation), train lengths (1500m coastal, 1800m inland) and container double stacking are crucial productivity issues that can provide a competitive advantage over other modes.

So the weighting in the study is biased towards the infrastructure provider rather than the train operators and their freight customers who provide the reason for building the infrastructure in the first place.

But then all that is complicated by the fact that no train operator (except for coal haulage) ever pays his way for using the rail infrastructure in the first place.

Should we do inland rail? Of course. We need to cater to a genuine need to connect Australia's two most economically important and viable cities that just happen to be far enough apart for rail to work properly.

And we need some rail system route redundancy between Melbourne and Brisbane to improve reliabilty.

But it's time to quit pouring taxpayer's money into a second-best coastal rail route and start putting some into the much better alternative.

[mufreight]

Well Mr Murphy got it right, why should we settle for second best, the inland line as proposed that is over 65km longer than it need be, will have a transit time that will be almost two hours slower and will cost somewhere between $500.000.000 and $900.000.000 more simply to keep the political mates happy and line their pockets.
A good question to ask your local member.

[Jon Bryant]

Excellent Article.  I have read the report and it has some assumptions that need to be challenged and a number of benefits that are missing or understated.  I agree that the train operations get little mention.

Here are my thoughts

Wrong Assumptions
1. little or no road transport will switch to rail - if the travel time was 22hrs then the switch could be massive - up to 50%;
2. traffic on the inland route would come mainly off the coastal route (i.e. little consideration that both routes will grow and that the new capacity on both will allow more growth in each corridors)
3. minimal induced demand
4. only limited economic growth (all rural - non allocated from urban areas)
5. peak oil does not exists.

Missing or Understated Benefits
1. Urban congestion reductions
2. Deferred urban freeway/motorway investment
3. Redcued urban road deaths
4. Reduced Greenhouse Gases/Costs and other externalities
5. Health improvements/cost reduction from reduced air pollution in urban areas.

Should this be a Brisbane-Melbourne line or a Gladstone-Melbourne line with Toowoomba as a dry port location?

[mufreight]

The proposed routing via Toowoomba is simply madness.
If the destination is Brisbane why build a line that is some 65km longer, will be two hours slower in transit time and cost between $5.000.000.000 and $9.000.000.000 more to build and which if built will have to make a choice between the operation of electric passenger services west of Rosewood or Double stacking of containers.
If the proposed destination is Gladstone then why make a 227km detour through Toowoomba which will permanently disadvantage rail in competition with road
Routing the line via Toowoomba has no positives other than for a collection of political camp followers who want to make a big quid at the expense of taxpayers.
The inland port idea for Toowoomba is again another example of gross stupidity, if in the interim period the line only reaches Toowoomba and freight for points to the east of the range is placed on road from there think of the upgrades needed to the road system to enable it to cope with the additional traffic.
At the present time the statistics tell the story and that is that the stretch of road between Toowoomba and Brisbane has the highest numbers of heavy vehicle accidents in the country and the greatest numbers of fatalities and some 'visionary' self serving imbicle is proposing putting between 5000 and 9000 tonnes of additional freight on that section of road.
One can only hope that those supporting this stupidity are all in a car wiped out by a B Double on the range and not your family.

[Jon Bryant]

Linking the rail to Gladstone via Toowoomba make sense for exports leaving or arriving into Australia.  The southern missing link is the shortest just west of Toowoomba and bypasses the whole SEQ region.  It also connects to significant mineral deposits.  Gladstone has sigificantly more capacity than the Port of Brisbane and is easier for ships to get in and out of.  Goods can also travel faster on the rail line than ship travelling to Sydney or Melbourne.  It would also allow for freight heading to Nth Queensland to bypass SEQ.  What other route would be a better option?

The issue of trucks travelling between Brisbane/Melbourne is a serious issue to be addressed but is a seperate issue to the Gladstone link.  If these can be converted to rail, together with the volumes travelling to/from Gladstone makes for an even more beneficial rail line.  One is export/import focused whilst the other is domestic focused.  The two destinations are not mutually exclusive.  They can co-exist together.

As the destinations and purposes are different, I agree that it makes no sense to have the line to Brisbane via Toowoomba. The shorter the transit times the greater the switch from road to rail.  There are also better locations for dry ports (which are connected to the wet port by shutle trains not road) both south and north of Brisbane.

[ozbob]

The federal Government has just announced funding for an improved road freight corridor Melbourne to Cairns!

They just don't get it, do they?

[Jon Bryant]

They sure don't.  More trucks on the roads equals more deaths, more pollution, more congestion, more noise, more CO2, more exposure to Peak Oil.   

[Jon Bryant]

The Network 1 component of the budget is an absolute waste of tax payers money.  $4.8 billion on less than 150 km of road and $27.7 billion over 6 years.  The inland railway is only $3.6 billion at the worst.

Can you just imagine the freight rail netwrok Australia could build with that investment and how the economy and cities would be revolutionised.

We must keep campaigning for this investment to be made in rail not less than 150km of road.