Faster trains will boost productivity
- Ross Lowrey
- Jun 24
- 2 min read
Implementation of a national high speed and faster regional rail network in the southeast of Australia will increase settlement in regional areas and generate a long-lasting productivity increase for Australia.
About a month ago we approached the Productivity Commission to see if they would accept a submission outlining how high speed rail could boost Australia's productivity. They gave us the thumbs up and so we quickly put together a submission outlining how shrinking distances enables commuting and same-day business trips over longer distances. This promotes increased settlement outside major cities and greater business interaction with regional centres. In Australia, it will promote greater settlement and economic activity in regional areas which will benefit everyone, including in Melbourne and Sydney which will continue to grow, but not as fast.
Of course, this won't be achieved by building a high speed line. We highlighted that government must plan and encourage liveable and sustainable urban development in regional cities to absorb an increased population and offer incentives to encourage greater business investment in regional areas. So its not just a rail plan, but a wider program focusing on decentralising our population growth.
We also highlighted the need for fast regional services to use the high speed line to speed up travel into existing regional centres along the existing conventional rail line. This will create a string-of-pearls settlement pattern by creating attractive communities each with their own identity separated by green areas of rural farms or bushland.
Our primary recommendation was for the Productivity Commission to conduct its own analysis of the productivity benefits of high speed and faster regional rail. This will eliminate the widely-held misconception that Australia is too large with too sparse a population to justify high speed rail that has held back the implementation of high speed rail in Australia. We also recommended the HSRA should start tackling the other high priority stages for high speed rail - Campbelltown-Southern Highlands, Canberra-Yass & Goulburn, and Broadmeadows-Seymour - in addition to its focus on Sydney-Newcastle.
