A consortium pushing a high-speed rail project will lodge an unsolicited bid to the Federal Government this year.
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Consolidated Land and Rail Australia (CLARA) wants to build a very fast train on Australia’s east coast along with eight ‘smart cities’ on the 915km Sydney to Melbourne route. One of these, with an estimated population of 350,000 to 400,000, would be around Goulburn.
CLARA chairman, Nick Cleary, who grew up in the Southern Highlands, won’t say exactly where.
“Our anchor city site is secured but it is confidential at this stage,” he told the Goulburn Post.
“As we progress and we lodge our bid, it will become clear.”
Mr Cleary said 35 to 50 per cent of the land required for the eight cities had been secured.
CLARA intends to lodge an unsolicited bid to the Federal Government for the project in the first half of this year. It has also appointed Hitachi Consulting Australia as its lead consultant to assist the bid. Mr Cleary said the Japanese linked company ran and operated trains in Europe and had a “tremendous attitude” to smart cities.
The smart cities would be built on greenfield sites no more than 15 minutes from existing centres. They would have a renewable energy, water recycling and modern technology focus with 100,000 to 200,000 dwellings.
In December, the government’s Standing Committee on Infrastructure, Transport and Cities, chaired by MP John Alexander endorsed the ‘value capture’ method that CLARA has employed. It’s a way of funding the project through a profit margin reaped by developers building along the rail corridor.
“Fifteen of the committee’s recommendations directly apply and are advantageous to CLARA,” Mr Cleary said.
“We want to decentralise Australia, ease congestion and increase housing affordability so it solves a lot of the government’s problems in one hit.”
If realised, a trip between Sydney and Canberra could take 20 minutes and Sydney to Melbourne, 110 minutes. Mr Cleary rejected reports that Canberra would only be included on the route through a ‘spur line.’ The route would go to Yass and then to Canberra, meaning Goulburn commuters could travel directly to the capital. But he said not all trains would go to Canberra.
The consortium hopes to start construction in stages on the $200 billion project in 2021/22 and be moving people five years later.