High speed rail in Australia
The Australian Government is planning for a future high speed rail network to connect Brisbane, Sydney, Canberra, Melbourne and regional communities across the east coast of Australia.
The first phase connects Newcastle to Sydney in about one hour on a new dedicated high speed railway. From the Central Coast it will take about 30 minutes to get to Newcastle or to Sydney.
Current progress
The Newcastle to Sydney corridor is currently being investigated as the first phase of the east coast high speed rail network that would be delivered.
The Authority is currently preparing a business case that is expected to be presented to the Australian Government by the end of 2024.
This work will be supported by a Product Definition Report which will look at the entire high speed rail network – including an approach to corridor preservation, broader stakeholder and community engagement, and environmental planning.
Connecting Newcastle to Sydney
The first phase of the east coast high speed rail network will connect the two largest cities in New South Wales – Sydney and Newcastle – via the Central Coast.
Key regions and cities within this corridor have strong economic activity.
Stable population growth, especially in Newcastle, is expected to continue and underpin its role as a global gateway.
The population of the Newcastle, Hunter Valley and Central Coast regions is expected to grow by 22 per cent to nearly 1.2 million by the early 2040s.
The Central Coast and Newcastle areas currently support more than 420,000 jobs.
New homes to accommodate growth are expected in major greenfield areas and key centres such as Gosford, Tuggerah/Wyong, Lake Macquarie and Newcastle.
The existing rail network between Newcastle and Sydney is the busiest in Australia.
Currently almost 15 million passengers are transported annually, along with significant volumes of freight.
Passenger services are often disrupted by freight train movements and the network is forecast to reach full capacity by the early 2040s.
The current Newcastle to Sydney journey time by train and car is about 2.5 hours and road travel is often impacted by traffic accidents – with many ‘single points of failure’ existing on the M1 motorway.
There are 91,000 trips every weekday on the road corridor between Newcastle / Lake Macquarie and Sydney.
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