Yarra Campaign for Action on Transport

From Kenneth Davidson, The Age, November 28, 2011

Successive Victorian governments have been keen to extend the Eastern Freeway from its Hoddle Street end via a tunnel under Melbourne Cemetery and Royal Park to CityLink.

It is a stinker. As most of the 40,000 cars hitting Hoddle Street at the morning peak want to get into the city, there will need to be exit ramps into Collingwood, Fitzroy and Carlton — which will cause inner-city gridlock.

The first inquiry into the east-west tunnel proposal for the Bracks government, in 2004, accepted the evidence of academic transport planner Paul Mees, who said that most of the traffic coming off the freeway went into central Melbourne and only 15 per cent went to the northern or western suburbs.

The 2004 study concluded that the need for extra road capacity was ”questionable” and the ”road tunnel options investigated are not considered justifiable, mainly because the economic benefits do not cover the high cost, and the social and environmental impacts are mixed”.

The Bracks government did not even bother to respond to the report.

In 2007 it set up a new inquiry under Sir Rod Eddington, staffed by bureaucrats from the pro-roads Transport Department. The first question it should have asked was where did the 2004 study go wrong.

Eddington’s report favoured the east-west link and two rail projects — the Melbourne Metro underground from Footscray to Caulfield and the Regional Rail Link from Footscray to Werribee. The report was delivered in 2008, two months after Eddington had been appointed chairman of Infrastructure Australia, whose task was to evaluate applications for funding infrastructure projects from state governments.

The Regional Rail Link, the most expensive transport infrastructure project ever approved, got $3.2 billion in Commonwealth funding for the now estimated $5 billion project. An independent review of the project in 2008 by Edward Dotson, a former transport planner for the World Bank who worked for the Melbourne Public Transport Authority, was scathing. He said the Eddington report could be best described as the ”pre-feasibility stage”.

This judgment was backed up by the head of the Transport Department, Jim Betts, who told an infrastructure conference two weeks ago that the $5 billion project had been ”budgeted on the back of an envelope”.

Betts was forced to apologise to Eddington by Premier Ted Baillieu. Betts said in his letter to Eddington that he wasn’t aware that journalists were at the conference.

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/politics/why-the-eastwest-road-tunnel-is-a-stinker-20111127-1o19f.html#ixzz1eynSgHLG

The Age: Libs ramp up priority for freeway (November 17, 2011)
Reid Sexton and Clay Lucas.

A controversial freeway through inner Melbourne and a new underground rail line have again topped the state’s wish list for funding from Canberra, with the Baillieu government saying it wants to proceed with a series of major transport projects first proposed by Labor.

The government today will unveil its submission to the federal government’s advisory body Infrastructure Australia. It marks the first release of the Coalition’s transport proposals since coming to office last November.

However, the submission does not say when any of the projects detailed would be built, or what they would ultimately cost. Premier Ted Baillieu said yesterday he did not want to make these predictions until more planning had been done.

The government has backed an 18-kilometre ”inner urban freeway” that would link the Eastern Freeway in Clifton Hill to the Western Ring Road in Sunshine. The freeway would travel via CityLink and the Port of Melbourne. It is based on a plan put forward by Sir Rod Eddington in 2008 in a report for the Brumby government. Sir Rod is now chairman of Infrastructure Australia.

This freeway plan was partially adopted by Mr Brumby’s government later in 2008, when it announced plans for WestLink, a $2.5 billion tunnel linking the inner west to the port. [Read more →]

The Age: East-west road tunnel back on the agenda (November 12, 2011)
Josh Gordon and Clay Lucas

A controversial road tunnel linking the western suburbs to the Eastern Freeway is back on the agenda for Melbourne, with Premier Ted Baillieu enthusiastically endorsing the idea ahead of a major infrastructure strategy to be unveiled early next week.

After facing criticism for failing to tackle congestion and maintain Melbourne’s coveted liveability, the state government has completed its major projects plan with Infrastructure Australia, with the controversial east-west road link high on the list.

Asked yesterday whether he backed the idea of the tunnel - proposed in 2008 by Infrastructure Australia chair Sir Rod Eddington - Mr Baillieu said: ”Yeah, you bet. We’ve always been supportive of an east-west link.” But Mr Baillieu said the real challenge would be finding the funding, with the plan almost certainly to involve a tollway and private operator.

”We want to set them out and get them right and get them correctly planned and that’s what we are embarking upon and I’ve had many of those discussions myself with Infrastructure Australia and I think they understand that and they support the position that we’ve taken.” [Read more →]

The Baillieu Government have launched their promised  $6.5m Doncaster Rail Study.

transport.vic.gov.au/projects/pt/doncaster-rail-link

YCAT has long campaigned for Heavy Rail to Doncaster and welcomes the study.

The study has been tasked to evaluate a range of possible routes linking Doncaster with the CBD. Establishing a route is the most important decision as there are many options, each with benefits and costs.

Heavy Rail to Doncaster promises to reduce pressure on the Eastern Freeway and inner city roads, reducing traffic and air pollution in highly populated areas. If linked with a Zero Carbon Stationary Energy Plan, electric trains can substantially reduce greenhouse gas emissions, especially during peak periods. Unfortunately this will not occur if Victoria persists with brown coal electricity such as the proposed HRL brown coal plant currently before VCAT.

The Minister for Public Transport Terry Mulder announced that the study will be led by Tim Gosbell from URS Australia, who recently lead the VicRoads Hoddle Street Study. [Read more →]

The Age: $4m Hoddle Street plan shelved - 21 March 2011

A report into how to fix Hoddle Street’s traffic problems, commissioned by the Brumby government at a cost to taxpayers of almost $4 million, will be shelved.

The Baillieu government will this year begin planning work on a railway line to Doncaster, first promised by conservative Premier Henry Bolte in 1969.

Premier Ted Baillieu has promised the railway line will be built along the Eastern Freeway’s median strip, with an expected impact on the amount of traffic along the connecting Hoddle Street.

As a result, a $3.7 million Hoddle Street study by engineers URS Australia, commissioned last February by the former government, will now not make any recommendations.

VicRoads’ director of the Hoddle Street study project, Agnelo Duarte, said the study team had “developed a number of preliminary broad solutions”.

But recommendations for major infrastructure works, originally promised by the former government to come out of the study, will now not be made. [Read more →]

Public Transport Policies and Priorities

Ycat Questions and Candidates Responses - Victorian State Election 2010

Richmond Electorate

Ycat has conducted a survey of the major political party’s to determine the policy and the personal commitment of candidates in the Richmond District, Victorian State Election 2010 to Public Transport Options and the proposed Hoddle Street road development.

Ycat undertook to publish candidate’s responses verbatim on the Ycat Website and to circulate these responses via newsletter.  Ycat has received responses from the Socialist Party, Labor Party and Greens Party and candidate’s responses are posted below. [Read more →]