Article: Residents 'in the dark' over rail line

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Residents 'in the dark' over rail line

Residents 'in the dark' over rail line
Clay Lucas
June 27, 2011

FOOTSCRAY residents affected by the expansion of a railway line through Melbourne's west have been left in doubt about the project's impact on their homes - just weeks before properties are to be bulldozed.

The Regional Rail Link is a new set of railway tracks from Southern Cross Station to Werribee. It was meant to cost $4.3 billion, but is now being budgeted by the Baillieu government at $5.3 billion.

The most expensive railway project in Victorian history, it will separate Geelong, Bendigo and Ballarat trains from the suburban system, to increase reliability and allow more services to run.

To build new tracks through a section of the existing Sydenham line in Footscray, the government has compulsorily acquired 63 homes and businesses. These will be either demolished or partially knocked down to make way for the new rail line. Demolition works are to begin in September.

But many residents along the rail line whose houses have not been bought, or which have been only partially acquired, say they remain in the dark about the project's impact on them.

A leaked Environment Protection Authority report, produced last year, shows an expected 53 trains an hour will use the rail corridor by 2016 - double the current number.

This would cause air pollution and ''chronic noise-induced sleep disturbance, with significant proportions 'highly disturbed''', the report found.

Two Footscray resident groups fighting to get more information from the Baillieu government about the project's potential impacts say it has been just as secretive as its predecessors about the new line.

Among those affected by the expanded rail line will be Jack Manallack, who lives in Victoria Street. The 88-year-old's house will be neighbour to the regional rail line once a factory next door, built by his father in 1947, is demolished.

The Regional Rail Link Authority previously offered to buy out Mr Manallack, who has lived in his house for 50 years, but he wants to stay.

''There are that many memories I've got here. My father passed away here, my wife passed away here, and I want to pass away here too.''

Born in nearby Buckley Street, Mr Manallack has been given no assurances that a brick wall that would protect him from noise and diesel fumes from trains will be left standing during demolition works.

In nearby Railway Place, on the other side of Footscray, residents have also been left shaken by scant details of an elevated rail line to be built behind their homes as part of the project. No noise protection barriers will be built as part of those works.

A further study on the project's impacts, commissioned in light of the EPA report, remains - at this stage - confidential.

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/residents-in-the-dark-over-rail-line-20110626-1gltn.html