A funding package worth $A 100m ($US 72.6m) has been agreed to upgrade the 321km Sydney - Canberra line in Australia. The federal government will provide $A 50m, with the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) that includes Canberra and the New South Wales state government each providing $A 25m.
Work on the five-year programme is expected to start later this year and will include:
- improvements to track alignment and turnouts
- new barriers and warning lights at level crossings to improve safety and enable train speeds to be increased, and
- station and train stabling improvements.
Planning and design work for the next phase of the project could include installing passing loops, superelevation of curves and straightening the alignment.
The route from Sydney to Canberra currently comprises the Sydney Trains-managed track between Sydney Central and Macarthur, the Southern Line through the Southern Highlands to Goulburn, where the infrastructure manager is the Australian Rail Track Corporation (ARTC), and the UGL Regional Linx-operated Country Regional Network (CRN) branch to Canberra.
The federal government will liaise with infrastructure managers and state transport departments to determine the most cost-effective interventions, with an immediate focus on the line between Goulburn and Canberra, to complement work already under way on the Southern Highlands line.
The financial package will also fund a business case to map out network upgrades and timetable improvements to help to improve efficiency and journey times, including the feasibility of introducing new express services. More than 3000 people currently travel between Sydney and Canberra by air or bus every day, while three train pairs of Canberra Xplorer trains operated by NSW Trainlink run between the cities each day, with a journey time of around 4 hours.
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