Bankstown metro: Inquiry calls for rail project to be scrapped
A NSW Parliamentary inquiry has roasted controversial plans to convert the Sydenham to Bankstown train line into part of the Sydney metro southwest.
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A NSW Parliamentary inquiry has found the State Government should scrap plans to convert the Sydenham to Bankstown Line into part of a multimillion-dollar Sydney Metro southwest project.
The Transport and Customer Service inquiry’s found the government should terminate at Sydenham, rather than continuing the $12.5 billion project through a further 10 stations to Bankstown, while also calling on the “immediate release” of the final business case and cost-benefit analysis for the project.
Committee chair and Greens Transport spokeswoman Abigail Boyd said the inquiry’s message was clear: “the NSW Government must stop ripping up the Bankstown rail corridor”.
“The case for the South West Metro project has not been made out,” Ms Boyd said following the release of the report.
“If the government was confident that the project would stand up to scrutiny, they would have released the full business case long ago.
“Our inquiry heard directly from the community — they don’t want to be forced to catch up to three trains just to get to work or university in the CBD.”
Ms Boyd said the government was “spending billions to rip up existing rail services solely to replace them with slower privatised services”.
The inquiry found the controversial project didn’t enjoy strong community support and called for the budget allocated to the conversion to be spent on “developing new rail corridors to communities which currently do not have rail services”.
Work is already well underway to upgrade facilities across the line to bring them up to “Metro standards” including plans to ensure all stations are “fully accessible with lifts and level access between platforms and trains”.
The NSW Government closed stations between Campsie and Sydenham along the T3 Bankstown Line in December and January to upgrade services as part of the Sydney Metro South West, with Transport for NSW arguing the conversion would “remove the bottleneck” and provide more reliable journeys across the line.
A spokeswoman for Transport Minister Andrew Constance told NewsLocal the government was “getting on with the job of delivering the largest infrastructure program in the country’s history”.
“We took the Southwest Metro upgrade to last year’s election, and won,” she said.
“We are focused on our commitment to the community and delivering this project.
“The upgrade work is supporting around 6,000 jobs and is also crucial to improving the reliability of the wider Sydney rail network.”
Mr Constance announced the tender process for the 50km Sydney Metro West stretching from the Sydney CBD to Greater Parramatta would be started.
“Now more than ever, infrastructure projects like Sydney Metro West support jobs, communities and the economy – Sydney Metro West will create more than 10,000 direct new jobs and 70,000 indirect jobs, with thousands of these jobs being generated by these new tunnelling contracts,” Mr Constance said.
The Restore Inner West Line and Save T3 Bankstown Line community action group called on the NSW Government to “implement the restoration of our tran services” following the inquiry findings today.
“Given the overwhelming evidence presented to the NSW Parliament, the government is without excuse for its unjustified removal of the Inner West Line train service from west of Bankstown in 2013,” a spokesman for the action group daid.
“It is clear that cuts to the Sydney Trains Network were designed to facilitate the introduction of Sydney Metro Southwest and ultimately result in increased over-development.”