Inland Rail delays

By DANE LILLINGSTONE

THE Downs and Surat Basin Alliance of Councils recently held a meeting debating the merits of the long awaited Inland Rail Project.
They have supported the call from the National Trunk Rail Group for the Federal Government to seek private investment through a competitive process to complete the project that would run from Melbourne to Brisbane and out to Miles.
The Australian Government has committed $300 million to the project and is expecting construction to commence this year.
Currently the Federal Government prefers Australian Rail Track Corporation to complete the job but alliance chairman Councillor Graeme Scheu said they were growing tired of the process.
“We attend forum after forum and we just don’t know who to believe any more,” he said.
The first tender was awarded earlier this month to international professional service company GHD. They will provide environmental and engineering consultancy on the first stages of the project in a sign that progress was finally being made.
However Cr Scheu is not convinced.
“This certainly does not mean we support any particular route or alignments as a matter of fact, we believe there is a distinct lack of commitment from State Governments to upgrade and maintain the existing feeder lines like Warwick, Quilpie and the Thallon/Goondiwindi line in our region which are an integral part of the network. For either project to succeed, it is imperative that regional feeder lines are included in either proposal from the outset,” he said.
“This winter has the potential to deliver one of the biggest grain harvests in the south-west Queensland and north-west NSW border region and it will all be on at this stage due to lack of rail services. Likewise there is massive push for livestock rail services from the Quilpie area back to the abattoirs along the Warrego line and for the Granite Belt and Warwick to capitalise on this opportunity, the feeder line from all three lines need to be included in the overall network.”