If you are the sort of person who would rather never ever ever read the news and remain in blissful ignorance of politics then a) you may have come to the wrong website but we’re still delighted you’re here, and b) you could ensure that you were ready for elections by setting a Google Alert for the term “high speed rail Australia”.
Like so many infrastructure projects it’s something which only ever gets mentioned during campaigns when politicians want to look like they have a big picture vision for the country, and then gets firmly put back in the election cupboard until next time.
In fact it’s so much of a joke that it’s literally the basis of an episode of Utopia. From season one. SEASON ONE, people.
It was first floated by the government of Malcolm Fraser in 1978, with a meeting of premiers to go “eh, sure, maybe” because everyone balked at the cost. Since then it’s been raised like clockwork by almost every government since and quietly killed off for the exact same reasons: the insane cost and lack of any clear need for it.
After Fraser’s flirtation, Bob Hawke looked into it in 1984. The Very Fast Train from Sydney to Canberra and Melbourne was a periodically favourite project of the Keating and Howard governments in the 90s, until Howard fell in love with the Speedrail project in time for the 1998 election.
Rudd and Gillard both revisited the Very Fast Train concept at strategically useful times, and Malcolm Turnbull reactivated it in 2016, reversing the Abbott government having shut it down, thereby annoying the Nationals.
And then this week the current PM [checks notes] Scott Morrison attempted to leaven his announcement of immigration cuts by pretending it was because of lessening pressure on infrastructure and that part of the answer was – quelle surprise! – high speed rail (followed by Labor unveiling their own strategy), including Sydney to Brisbane in just half an hour at sci-fi speeds over 1200 kmph.
And sure, it’s nice to see a tacit admission that the problem with Australia’s infrastructure isn’t immigrants but governmental failures to address infrastructure, but even so the problems with this plan are legion.
For a start, the fastest passenger trains in the world – Japan’s Shinkansen High-Speed Train Network – travel at a bit over 300kmph. Which is amazingly high speed, but only a quarter what Mozza is claiming his magic choo-choo will achieve.
Secondly, rail is staggeringly expensive to build. A conventional high-speed rail link would need an estimated $200 billion just for the Sydney-Melbourne leg, and that’s before you factor in the inevitable overruns which dog every infrastructure project.
There’s also the problem that we don’t, y’know, actually need it.
“…provided we have a rail corridor down the east coast that takes in major regional centres.”
Sure, it would be nice and useful and certainly environmentally responsible… provided that we took a large percentage of the trucks off the roads which are currently delivering freight, and the airplanes from the skies which are currently delivering passengers.
And which government wants to wear the inevitable campaign about job losses in transport and aviation thanks to a government-subsidised competitor?
And we might want to check whether any of the politicians and consultants who have been privy to discussions about the likely rail corridor have, say, purchased cheap land along it in the hopes forcing a massive sale price back to the government.
Not that we’re saying that’s happened, of course, no no no no no no!
What’s more, it’s a massive undertaking that would require coordinated effort by multiple governments over subsequent terms – something which Australia doesn’t have a great history with. Isn’t that right, National Broadband Network? How’s things, National Disability Insurance Scheme?
Still, it’s always fun to see politicians boasting and arguing about projects they know will never, ever, ever happen.
After all, there’s nothing more important to discuss right at the moment, right?
