Monash University attacks Suburban Rail Loop plans

Monash has attacked Melbourne’s proposed rail loop, warning it risks damaging university buildings, equipment and even its reputation.

Tertiary and research institutions in the path of the $34.5 billion Suburban Rail Loop warn its current design risks damaging sensitive equipment, buildings, and even their reputations.

Monash University has led the charge attacking the SRL East project’s Environmental Effects Statement (EES), saying it has not properly considered the potential hit to the precinct’s learning, accommodation and research facilities during construction.

The university, which would get a new underground station to the north of its Clayton campus when the 26km tunnel opens in 2035, says the EES lacks detail about tunnelling impacts that “will affect the University’s ability to operate, and meet its longer-term strategic goals”.

Concerns about the effect of the project, which would link Cheltenham to Box Hill via six stations, have been revealed before EES public hearings next month.

Monash University would get a new train station to the north of its Clayton campus. Picture: Supplied

And this week the Herald Sun will reveal details of construction chaos expected across station precincts at Cheltenham, Clayton, Glen Waverley, Monash, Burwood, and Box Hill.

Suburban Rail Loop Minister Jacinta Allan vowed project construction would begin this year, paving the way for 8000 jobs and “more than just a rail line”.

“It’s also about supporting how Melbourne and Victoria grow in the decades ahead and shaping our growing middle suburbs so there are more jobs, homes, services and open spaces closer to home,” she said.

Monash University’s EES submission reveals it has had “detailed discussions” with the SRL Authority about potential alternative alignments for the tunnel, but “none of those are referred to in the EES”.

It says there is inadequate acknowledgment of the loss of a 120-place childcare centre and 101 student accommodation beds due to acquisitions, while a 938-student accommodation block and a Bioresources facility could suffer from poor air quality.

The detailed underground path Suburban Rail East will follow through Melbourne’s middle suburbs.

“The University considers that these impacts will also cause reputational damage and weaken its position in the competitive tertiary education market,” it says.

“The most that can be said in this regard is that the Project provides the potential to be a city shaping Project with the possibility of future benefits; equally however it provides no certainty that this potential will be realised and also raises the possibility of future disbenefits.”

Other submissions, including from the nearby CSIRO, also take aim at the lack of detail in the EES, saying it may need purpose-built facilities to house sensitive equipment such as electron microscopes.
Deakin University in Burwood — which will also benefit from a new station — says while it broadly supports the plan there is “insufficient” information about noise and vibration impacts.

Suburban Rail Loop Authority chief executive Frankie Carroll told the Herald Sun that “although we’re mostly working underground, for a project of this size some impacts are unavoidable”.

“We are doing everything we can to carefully manage construction in these built-up areas to keep community disruption to a minimum,” he said.