Balmain light rail dream faces death by a thousand cuts?

Increased heavy vehicle movements now roar around The Crescent and Victoria Rd. These compete with local residents for precious road and cycle space, often through gritted teeth. White Bay’s new ‘state of the art’ cruise terminal presents a great holiday experience (so long as you don’t rely on public transport to reach it) and the Convention Centre – about to be transferred to Glebe Island later this year, thereby shouldering Darling Harbour’s makeover aspirations – is set to follow suit. 

“Build ’em more roads” appears to be the government’s only response, but is this really appropriate?

Beneath the Victoria Rd underpass, just parallel to the CityWest Link, sits an old overgrown rail corridor, connecting Lilyfield to White Bay.

In recent years, local residents, EcoTransit Sydney, the Leichhardt Liberals and the State Greens have imagined using it for another light rail service across the northern quadrant of the Inner West.

This old freight line could be easily adapted to serve the community’s of Rozelle, White Bay, Glebe Island, Balmain and even the new cruise terminal. EcoTransit Sydney believes this line could also be extended across Darling Harbour to Barangaroo and Wynyard – thereby providing an Inner West light rail service, which is half an hour faster into the northern CBD.

On Monday July 15, the inner west light rail contractor, John Holland, removed some 20 metres of this idle rail corridor near Lilyfield. This was a very strategic rail portion, where the spur itself connects with the rest of the Inner West Light Rail line. They then poured a concrete slab across part of the site where those tracks had been, hindering their clear corridor run to White Bay and Balmain. The new slab will apparently cater for ‘an electricity substation’, near a new stabling yard. Track removal like this has happened once before…

Last year, Sydney Ports removed 400 metres of this 3.6-kilometre line, to build a road through White Bay, only ever used when cruise ships are in port. This rapid and unapproved action was exposed by EcoTransit Sydney and publicly condemned by the Department of Planning, before strangely being approved in retrospect, early this year.

Both incidents display a clear reluctance by the State to protect any potential corridors for future light rail across the Inner West, beyond that already heading to Dulwich Hill. Neither incident kills the potential for services to Balmain, but they certainly make it more expensive given the cost of any future track replacement. Facilities such as stabling yards and substations were not worth jeopardizing this rail line for – they could’ve been placed anywhere across Rozelle Rail Yards site and done the same job.

This smacks of clumsy planning – for too long, rail infrastructure has played second fiddle in NSW Transport decisions. Even now, the Government wishes to prioritize the development of a ‘new port access road’ beneath the Victoria Road underpass (where these rails sit) to Glebe Island – but few residents in Balmain are likely aware that this will most likely only serve only heavy truck movements, and stop the possibility of getting light rail to Balmain.

A spokesperson tried earlier to suggest that former Planning Minister Tony Kelly was to blame, signing off on the plans in 2010 – but forget that, this latest track removal is on the current Government’s watch. Government websites clearly state that John Holland is responsible for the ‘design and construction of this project, on behalf of the NSW Government’, and this contract was awarded by Transport Minister Berejiklian mid last year for $176million, minus a GreenWay. 

Since then, a substantial redesign of Labor’s previous and much cheaper approval has taken place – mysteriously with a much higher level of engineering than we had thought would be previously required – and its taking longer. Despite the release of the Long Term Transport Master Plan – we see no plans to build light rail to Balmain – or a detailed plan to maximise the appeal of the existing light rail corridor, but a plan to build a number of new motorways certainly does exist…

Clearly the community needs to be better engaged and their ideas heard – this ongoing death by a thousand cuts for the Rozelle Goods Line, is not a reflection of good governance. The same could be said of the Glebe Island Bridge – and again, what IS the plan? Certainly the community has one – and what of transparency?

It’s extremely hard for the public to remain effectively engaged across all developments, especially when plans and approvals aren’t easily found online – Lilyfield light rail stop’s refurbishment, a case in point at the time of writing this piece.

Transparency is key; these avoidable mistakes reflect an overly protected bureaucracy, kept at arm’s length from the community, with a seeming contempt for the community’s vision. If the Government wishes to downplay this perception, perhaps it’s time the Minister for Planning and the Minister for Transport get together and conduct a serious cost- benefit analysis for light rail across the Bays Precinct – and particularly before their departments and agencies squander the existing infrastructure entirely. They might actually find by doing so, that less roads are needed.

By Nathan English

Nathan English is a committee member for EcoTransit Sydney, a not for profit, community-based, public and active transport advocacy group – and a Master of Planning student at UNSW.

Information on EcoTransit Sydney can be accessed via the group’s website, Facebook page and YouTube channel where practical solutions for Sydney’s transport future can be found.