Infrastructure Australia Sydney’s best hope for missing road links

2 July 2010

The Sydney Business Chamber said that funding from Infrastructure Australia was the only way that proposals to complete Sydney’s missing road links including the M4 East and widening of the M5 would be delivered in the immediate future given the NSW Government’s on-the-table, off-the-table approach to transport.

“The Government has continued its lack of strategic approach to transport policy.  Proposals to build the M4 East have been announced, scrapped or shelved by nearly every Premier over the last two decades,” said Patricia Forsythe, Executive Director of the Sydney Business Chamber.

“We need to complete Sydney road links, especially those that link Sydney’s business growth areas in Sydney’s West with Port Botany and Sydney Airport, but at the same time we can’t continue to ignore investment in public transport.

“We support these proposals going to Infrastructure Australia to secure funding that will get these projects off the drawing board and actually built.”

Mrs Forsythe said that the NSW Government had ignored the advice of the Sydney Business Chamber to retain the M4 toll as a way to fund transport infrastructure even though a poll of Sydneysiders showed 70% supported such an initiative.

“The Government scrapped the M4 toll for short-term expediency.  Now there are proposals to return the toll to fund the expansion and extend of the M4 to the City. It’s time to come up with a long-term plan and approach to transport in Sydney and stick with it.”

“The M4/M5 cashback scheme is an example of the Government’s mixed approach to transport.  Nearly $1 billion of taxpayer’s money has been spent encouraging people to use the M4 and M5 instead of the public transport that runs parallel to them – no wonder we have a congestion problem on these roads.”

Mrs Forsythe said the NSW Government needed to work harder with the private sector to unlock private capital that could deliver the transport infrastructure Sydney needs in a shorter timeframe.

“The private sector has been burnt by the Government over the CBD Metro, road tunnels and Sydney Ferries.  There is a hard job to be done to rebuild confidence with the private sector and until that is done commuters will be the ones who pay the price.”