The City of Greater Bendigo is calling on the state government to expand the Bendigo Metro rail project to improve access for regional commuters.
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The city’s regional sustainable development manager, Trevor Budge, said an expanded Bendigo Metro would allow for more regular services without running up against the bottleneck in outer metropolitan Melbourne.
“We think the big initiative is to get away from a thought that all trains must travel between Melbourne and Bendigo,” he said.
“There’s no reason why a Bendigo Metro rail service can’t also include the concept of a train going from say, Castlemaine, Harcourt, Kangaroo Flat, Bendigo, out to Eaglehawk.”
Mr Budge also called on the government to prioritise the duplication of the line between Bendigo and Kyneton to allow the extra services to pass each other outside designated passing loops.
“We’ve got passing loops between Bendigo and Kyneton but there’s long sections which are single track,” he said.
“We need to see the line duplicated between Kyneton and Bendigo, at the moment the government’s allocated about $500 million to do that for the Ballarat line, to finish the duplication of the Ballarat line, we think the Bendigo line is the next line that should be duplicated.”
Public Transport Users Association regional spokesman Paul Westcott backed Mr Budge’s call for the duplication of the line, saying it was “essential” for an expanded Bendigo Metro to be worthwhile.
“Before you can start running actual services, particularly short services between Castlemaine and Bendigo or wherever, you certainly need track capacity to be expanded,” he said.
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“You’ve got to get a commitment from the government to do that, or to do at least as much as is necessary to achieve the sort of of services you want to run.”
Mr Westcott said reversing a previous government’s “unfortunate” decision to reduce the line to a single track would be an expensive exercise, but would become more affordable if done strategically.
“Sadly when they put the single track in beyond Kyneton they moved it into the centre of the formation so it’s not just a question of adding another track alongside the existing one anymore, you have to actually move the existing track over,” he said.
“Even if you don’t duplicate, or the government is reluctant to duplicate, the whole thing, you certainly can get significant duplication and therefore allow trains to pass each other more easily and that obviously increases capacity and that’s basically what they’re doing on the Ballarat line.”
Public Transport Minister Jacinta Allan was contacted for comment.