A split has emerged in the Andrews government over the roll-out of a rail extension to Mernda, with local MP Danielle Green adamant that trains will be running within four years, contradicting senior ministers who said that construction will merely “commence” by then.
The government has so far avoided committing itself to a specific date for completing the eight-kilometre rail extension, only promising to start work in its first term.
Public Transport Minister Jacinta Allan reiterated that stance before a Public Accounts and Estimates Committee hearing on Friday when she said construction “will be commenced within four years”.
But the testimony was at odds with public comments Ms Green made earlier this made that the line will be “operational” by 2018.
Ms Green, who holds the marginal seat of Yan Yean in Melbourne’s northern fringe, through which the Mernda rail extension will run, made the emphatic commitment to a Mernda community group on Facebook.
“The rail extension is still planned to be operational by the next election,” Ms Green wrote on May 6, the day after the budget was delivered.
“The $9 million in project planning funds will finalise details of the line eg. station locations, car parking etc and whether all points where the line intersects with roads and waterways will be delivered as road tunnels or overpasses. When this highly detailed project planning and consultation with effected (sic) residents is completed the exact time of shovels in the ground will be known.”
Contacted by The Age on Monday, Ms Green stuck to her position, but refined it to say she expected the rail extension to be operational in financial year 2018-19.
“Mernda [rail] can be operational by the next election, unlike Melbourne Metro,” Ms Green said.
But Ms Allan declined to provide a firm date for the extension’s completion on Monday, saying only that planning for Mernda rail is under way and a detailed timeline for the delivery of the project will be determined through the planning and business case.
“The member for Yan Yean is rightly pushing hard for the Mernda rail extension to happen as soon as possible,” Ms Allan said.
The Mernda rail extension was promised by all major political parties at last year’s election, although Labor promised to build it earlier and for less money than the Coalition, which pledged to build it by 2021 at a cost of $700 million.
The government committed just $9 million in its first budget to begin planning the $400 million-$600 million rail extension, but has not locked in any funds in subsequent years to build it. It says construction money will be allocated next year.
Griff Davis, director of advocacy at the City of Whittlesea, said the council expected the rail extension to be operational within four years.
“We would expect that it would be open some time in the 2018-19 financial year, on the basis that if there is $9 million for planning in 2015-16, then after three years of construction it would be completed and operational,” Mr Davis said.
This story first appeared in The Age
