Railway

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EXPERT OBSERVATION
In a classic catch 22 example of a planning system of contradictions, the Independent Planning Commission has preferred to respect local character over a council’s proposal for development around a railway station.
Lane Cove Council has been proposing for some years that new housing development belocated at St Leonards South, near St Leonards station, in what would seem to be a good example of Transit Oriented Development.
Generally the state government has supported proposals by local councils but in this instance the government’s Independent Planning Commission has dismissed the council’s proposal on the basis that the planning proposal did not respect the existing local character of the area.
The Urban Taskforce is concerned that a NSW Government planning document issued in February 2019 titled ‘Local Character and Place Guideline’ seems to promote a preferredsuburban character with no buildings over 3 storeys high in the publication. 
We believe the government is sending signals to the community that a suburban character is better that an urban character, with taller apartment buildings. 
It would appear that the local community in StLeonards South have been encouraged by the government’s promotion of local character as being suburban, to argue against change even when their own council has proposed the new apartment precinct.
It seems that the Department of Planning, Industry and Environment will have the final say onthe St Leonards South precinct plan, but our concern is that their own documents promote the importance of local character over Transit Oriented Development around railway stations.
The Urban Taskforce supports Lane Cove Council’s sensible proposal to accommodate housinggrowth in a precinct adjacent to St Leonards Station and close to the proposed Crows Nest metro station. 
We are very concerned at a growing approach from planners in some councils and within the government to be promoting the respect of local character rather than providing a leadership role in where new more urban precincts should occur around railway stations.
Chris Johnson is the Chief Executive Officer of Urban Taskforce
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Respecting local character rules stopping new development around railway stations: Chris Johnson

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GUEST OBSERVATION
Governments are looking to fast rail services to regional cities to relieve population pressures in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane. The federal government is funding <a href="https://www.infrastructure.gov.au/rail/trains/faster_rail/index.aspx" target="_blank">nine business cases</a> for such schemes. But what economic effect might these fast links have on the regional cities?
The current fast rail schemes seem oriented at relieving population pressures in the major cities rather than a productive regional economic purpose. The minister for population, cities and urban infrastructure recently <a href="https://minister.infrastructure.gov.au/tudge/media-release/better-managing-australias-future-population-growth" target="_blank">stated</a>:
"The National Faster Rail Agency begins operating from today [July 1]. The new Agency will oversee the government’s 20-year fast rail agenda, which will connect satellite regional cities to our big capitals. This will allow people to reside in regional centres with its [sic] cheaper housing and regional lifestyle but still access easily and daily the major employment centres."
The argument seems built on a pitch to city workers priced out of metropolitan housing markets. It treats regional towns as remote dormitories for metropolitan workers rather than as regional cities that serve as service hubs and employment centres. But will subsidising metropolitan workers to live in cheaper regional towns have a positive economic effect on those towns?
An unequal relationship
Concern is growing among international observers that <a href="https://www.51m.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/ch51.pdf" target="_blank">fast rail connections between two cities benefit the larger of the pair</a>. Professor <a href="https://www.centreforcities.org/event/city-horizons-professor-michael-storper/" target="_blank">Michael Storper observed</a>: "One of the biggest mistakes we’ve made was being naïve about connectivity – give infrastructure and it spreads. Well, often it concentrates. The high-speed train network in France, guess what it did. It advantaged Paris."
While Paris is seen as benefiting the most from the national fast rail TGV service, the regional cities of <a href="http://www.greengauge21.net/wp-content/uploads/hsr-regneration-of-cities.pdf" target="_blank">Lyon and Lille have strengthened their economic positions</a>. The Lyon and Lille fast rail stations form the hub of their respective regional transport networks and have attracted new commercial activity. They also sit at intersections of major European fast rail networks.
It’s a pattern that cannot be easily achieved for Australia’s regional cities due to our widely dispersed settlements. So what does this mean for our regional cities?
Improving transport infrastructure doesn’t just improve regional business access to metropolitan markets. It decrease the costs of trade in both directions. And large cities are typically more productive economically. This is because they offer more specialised goods and services and can leverage the agglomeration effects of shared high-quality labour markets and infrastructure, plus a concentration of skills and knowledge.
Reduced travel times can mean regional businesses become less efficient than metropolitan competitors that can offer a wider range of specialist goods and services. This may lead to regional business closures, employment losses and wage decline. Unless a regional city is able to develop a specialised set of high-skill, high-wage industries that complement or outcompete the metropolis it risks being economically disadvantaged by faster rail.
New regional demand arising from commuter population growth might counter the loss of higher-order regional jobs due to improved transport links. But that will largely be in lower-value retail and personal service sectors. The result will still be a net economic gain for the metropolis.
An influx of commuters earning metropolitan wages might also <a href="https://www.news.com.au/finance/real-estate/melbourne-vic/geelong-prices-soften-as-buyers-await-outcome-of-federal-election/news-story/ea4cc61d089f669d26cf5b10b7ceab80" target="_blank">inflate regional housing markets</a>. This would disadvantage lower-paid regional workers. The beneficiaries of this scenario are likely to be local rentiers, such as landholders and developers who can profit from land-price inflation.
This interest group will likely vocally promote regional fast rail. But sustainable economic prosperity for regional cities requires more than population-driven land speculation.
The example of Geelong
The most advanced of the current Australian proposals is the <a href="https://minister.infrastructure.gov.au/tudge/media-release/geelong-melbourne-travel-cut-half-part-20-year-fast-rail-plan" target="_blank">Geelong-Melbourne route</a>. It has received federal and state <a href="https://www.propertyobserver.com.au/https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-03-22/fast-rail-train-service-pledge-for-geelong/10927982" target="_blank">funding for planning</a> with an estimated total cost of <a href="https://www.theage.com.au/politics/victoria/andrews-in-about-face-on-building-geelong-fast-rail-with-morrison-20190531-p51tbz" target="_blank">at least A$10 billion</a>. But planners need to ask how this spending will provide a net economic benefit, and how the benefits will be distributed.
Growth in commuter population and the services this attracts may be seem like a resolution to metropolitan population problems, but could further concentrate higher-paid jobs in Melbourne. Faster commutes mean Melbourne-based firms will have a greater pick of Geelong-based workers, thus consolidating metropolitan competitive advantage. Fast rail thus risks placing Geelong at a competitive disadvantage, with jobs and workers being exported to Melbourne.
Meanwhile the pressure of housing another <a href="https://www.planning.vic.gov.au/land-use-and-population-research/victoria-in-future" target="_blank">145,000 residents in the next 20 years</a> already falls on Geelong, a <a href="https://www.propertyobserver.com.au/https://quickstats.censusdata.abs.gov.au/census_services/getproduct/census/2016/quickstat/203?opendocument" target="_blank">city of 280,000 people</a>. The strain on infrastructure and services is proportionately greater than would be the case in Melbourne, which has <a href="https://quickstats.censusdata.abs.gov.au/census_services/getproduct/census/2016/quickstat/2GMEL?opendocument" target="_blank">nearly 5 million</a> residents.
What can policymakers do about this?
To resolve this conundrum, thought must be given to what specialised high-value jobs will be attracted to regional cities to accompany fast rail investments, so these cities remain competitive and productive, regionally, nationally and internationally. This might include policies such as relocating public agencies, regional targeting of university-based research and development spending, boosting services such as schools and hospitals, and providing incentives for innovative private companies to relocate to regional towns.
Policymakers should also consider positioning regional cities as rail network hubs in their own right. An example would be connecting Geelong, Ballarat and Bendigo by rail, along with better linkages to national and international airports.
We don’t yet know for sure what the effects of fast rail on regional cities will be. But the impact of this infrastructure needs to be assessed very carefully lest it turns Australia’s regional cities into dependent population dormitories rather than regional dynamos, at vast public expense.<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/119090/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important; text-shadow: none !important;">
Todd Denham, PhD Candidate, School of Global, Urban &amp; Social Studies, RMIT University
Jago Dodson, Professor of Urban Policy and Director, Centre for Urban Research, RMIT University
This article is republished from <a href="http://theconversation.com" target="_blank">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/regional-cities-beware-fast-rail-might-lead-to-disadvantaged-dormitories-not-booming-economies-119090" target="_blank">original article</a>.
Main photo: <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/" target="_blank">CC BY-NC</a>. 
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Regional cities beware – fast rail might lead to disadvantaged dormitories, not booming economies

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There’s relief coming for workers who have been driven mad by the bumper to bumper.
The budget seeks to encourage the workforce to instead park and ride on the train.
The first funds will be spent at Hurstville, Panania, Gosford and Woy Woy.
The $500 million national program has been dubbed the Commuter Car Park Fund.
It is aimed at providing carparking for the workers wishing to commute to work rather than drive into the increasingly congested CBD.
The bulk will be spent at Gosford which will get a $30 million car park. Panania and Hurtsville gets a $7.5 million allocation with $5 in Woy Woy.
“The Commuter Car Park Fund will allow more people to park and ride, taking tens of thousands of cars off our major roads per day,” the budget papers noted.
“This fund will focus on immediate, practical measures to cut travel times within our cities.
"Removing bottlenecks and improving travel corridors,” the Treasurer said.
It will include a $500 million Commuter Car Park Fund that will improve access to public transport hubs and take tens of thousands of cars off our roads.
NSW is budgeted to get a $50 million car park building allocation which comes under the $4 billion Urban Congestion Fund, which has been boosted by $3 billion.
It comes as Sydney residents have been increasingly frustrated by the unavailability of carparking at railway stations, and also annoyed at the increased road congestion.
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Car park construction spree for select railway stations 

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Sydney’s new underground CBD metro railway stations are taking shape about 25 metres under the centre of the city.
The Sydney Metro City &amp; Southwest project is the first new rail line through Sydney since the 1970s and will reduce travel times for commuters across the whole system.
Premier Gladys Berejiklian and Minister for Transport and Infrastructure Andrew Constance today met workers and had the first look at major construction work at the Martin Place Metro Station.
“It’s incredible to see the progress that’s been made by machines and workers underground with thousands of pedestrians moving above ground,” Berejiklian said.
“Two roadheader tunnelling machines are working 24-7 to excavate the new Martin Place station, which stretches underground between Hunter Street and Martin Place.
“This project is really taking shape and when it opens, customers in the heart of Sydney’s CBD will be more connected than ever before.”
<img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dz9xllyip/image/fetch/c_scale,w_580,q_auto:good/https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/po.images/2019/2/28/190131_Martin20Place20Station_016.jpg" alt="">
Constance said the Martin Place metro platform caverns will be about 220 metres long, 16 metres high and 14 metres wide when fully lined with concrete.
“Roadheaders and about 95 workers have already excavated more than 166,620 tonnes of crushed rock at Martin Place – enough to fill about 26 Olympic swimming pools,” he said.
“They are also digging underground pedestrian connections to the existing Eastern Suburbs Line, making it easier to get around our great city.
“This once again shows that only the NSW Liberals &amp; Nationals Government will deliver Metro rail across Sydney.
“When Labor was last in office they announced 12 rail projects. They did not deliver one in full and they are already promising to cancel the Sydenham to Bankstown Metro upgrade.”
Sydney Metro will deliver a turn-up-and-go train service up to every two minutes to the four train stations being built in the Sydney CBD – Martin Place, Pitt Street, Barangaroo and Central.
Sydney Metro Northwest is on track to open in the coming months and is at least half a billion dollars under budget. It includes 13 Metro stations and 4000 commuter car parking spaces.
Metro rail is being extended from the north west, into the CBD and beyond to Bankstown in 2024, delivering Sydney 31 metro stations and a 66 kilometres standalone metro railway line.
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