Re: Railway upgrade to separate freight and passenger trains

[mauried@tpg.com.au (Maurie Daly)]

On Tue, 1 May 2001 22:49:02 +1000, "James C."
<james_ccj@optusnet.com.au> wrote:

>http://www.abc.net.au/news/newslink/nat/newsnat-1may2001-61.htm
>
>Railway upgrade to separate freight and passenger trains
>
>A $500 million upgrade of the nation's rail tracks is being proposed to
>increase the use of rail for freight.
>
>The Australian Track Corporation has completed an audit of Australia's
>interstate rail network and has found it is sorely in need of an upgrade,
>particularly on the eastern seaboard.
>
>Corporation chief executive David Marchant says Sydney is blocking the whole
>freight system.
>
>Rail is currently only taking 20 per cent of all freight between Sydney and
>Melbourne.
>
>Mr Marchant says a separate freight track through Sydney would help the
>whole nation.
>
>"Partly it is because tracks are requiring upgrading, but the real issue is
>that there isn't a freight link separate from the passenger link through
>Sydney," Mr Marchant.
>
>"Therefore, the freight trains have to compete with the passenger trains to
>get through and it clogs up the passenger system.
>
>"What this proposes, is separating the freight lines from passenger lines to
>enable freight trains to move easily in and out of Sydney."
>
>
>Cheers
>James
>
>
Its been talked about for years , having a separate freight line thru
Sydney.
But heres the problem.
If we are going to have a hi speed freight line direct from Melb to
Brisbane which doesnt go thru Sydney , then there is no need of a
separate freight line thru Sydney , as there will be very few thru
trains , they will all be running on the new line.

This is one of the fundamental problems of having multiple rail
projects each of which are independant on the rest .

It also begs the question of what freight will continue to run on the
existing interstate freight lines , and on the AP to darwin line if
its ever built .
There certainly isnt enuf freight to require them all.

MD