2nd Harbour Crossing - 2 for the price of 1
10:01 pmI've been doing some thinking about the proposed second harbour crossing, apparently Sydney's next major rail project after the North West Rail Link (NWRL). I have an idea that I believe would be significantly cheaper and could potentially provide two harbour crossings for the price of one.
The idea is based on the concept of breaking apart the City Circle. This will allow for double the capacity of trains to enter the city circle then exit on new alignments. The first diagram below shows the existing City Circle line in green. At the bottom of the diagram you can see the Western line, Bankstown line and East Hills line all entering the City Circle.
The second diagram below shows how new alignments could break apart the City Circle and allow the East Hills line to run separately from the Western line and Bankstown line.
The East Hills line could exit Circular Quay and continue west to provide a new station at Barangaroo then cross the harbour in a submerged tunnel exiting at Balmain. This could provide a new station at the proposed international passenger terminal, and the old freight lines at Lilyfield could be used as stabling yards. In the future this line could be extended along the Victoria road corridor similar to the metro proposal.
The Western line and Bankstown lines would continue north from Town Hall, connecting Wynyard station at the unused Platforms 1 and 2 then continue north across the eastern side of the harbour bridge as it was originally designed. A new tunnel would connect North Sydney to St Leonards via Crows Nest, in the future this tunnel could be expanded east to a Northern Beaches line. From St Leonards the line would be quadruplicated to Chatswood separating the North West line from the North Shore line.
The East Hills line could also be directed through the existing City Circle platforms at Wynyard then turn west and cross darling harbour to Pyrmont similar to the metro proposal. This line might continue west to Glebe, Annandale and Leichhardt. This would remove a significant number of busses from the CBD and provide faster CBD connections for these high density inner city neighbourhoods.
The third diagram shows how a new CBD alignment could separate the Western line from the Bankstown line and delivery express services directly into the CBD. This would allow rail services to provide rapid and reliable services from Parramatta to Sydney in under 20 minutes.
The map below shows how these alignments might work.
When compared with the governments plans for an expensive tunnel deep under Sydney harbour connecting Chatswood to Redfern, this proposal would be cheaper to construct, provide more communities access to rail services and provide future options for expanding the rail network.
Unfortunately nearsighted decisions to build the NWRL as a separate metro style service with a smaller diameter tunnel will severely limit the flexibility needed to explore proposals such as this one.
2 comments
I do like your idea of breaking up the city circle to build the Western half of the ANZAC line. I was wondering why you decided not to use the reserved corridor on the Western side of the CBD in your spur line that connects the city to the inner west? It could allow you to utilise Wynyard station, then build a new station 'City West' next to Townhall then continue the line out to Sydney Uni etc following the West metro to Paramatta.
ReplyDeleteThe idea here is breaking up the city circle, to be honest I didn't put a lot of thought into the alignments. I think the idea of breaking up the city circle would significantly reduce the cost of tunnelling though the CBD. It's crazy to have so many empty trains doing a circle in the CBD. The existing infrastructure would be better utilised with services passing through the CBD with opportunities for interchange.
ReplyDeleteThe ANZAC line alignment would work, it would provide better integration with interchange at Wynyard. Although I think the Barrangaroo to White Bay crossing would provide a significant opportunity for good quality transit orient development on both sides of the harbour. It might also allow for interchange with the light rail for inner west access to the CBD north and stabling on the old freight lines at Lilyfield. I don't think there are many opportunities for investment along the ANZAC line alignment. Pyrmont is done and Roselle is too controversial.
These projects need to be aligned with opportunities for private investment in TOD. They also need to be affordable and utilise the infrastructure we already have. The Harbour Bridge is wasted on the Cahill Expressway and the city circle in inefficient.
Highest priority should be the CBD access line(s) to allow for network separation. Then we can do the harbour crossings on the cheap. My diagrams are not very accurate, don't look at the western lines... I've corrected these since.
Thank for the comment.