After a good few years of ups and downs, and months of "will they, won't they?" the NSW Government has confirmed that the development of Metro West will go ahead – though not as soon as we might have hoped. The Minns Labor Government announced today that an enhanced Sydney Metro West project will be delivered, with an estimated completion date of 2032. Although the inner Sydney part of the Metro will open in 2024, and the nine-year wait isn’t the news that Western Sydney was hoping to hear, the timeline came with a silver lining in the form of the promise of affordable housing developments along the new Metro West route.
An independent review into the project has concluded that Sydney Metro West should be constructed along a nine-stop route, with the option for additional stops to be added in the future. It would give tens of thousands of people frequent transportation between suburbs themselves and the city, with trains running every four minutes.
The review also highlighted the importance of a holistic placemaking strategy in line with the construction of the transport system, involving a focus on much-needed affordable housing along the route.
“Sydney Metro West is the biggest public transport project in the country. But we’re resetting Metro West to ensure it will be the city-shaping project it always should have been,” says Premier Chris Minns.
“We need well-located houses and apartments near well-connected transport infrastructure, so people have a place to call home, where they can move around our city easier. Metro West is the beginning of this.”
The exact location of the new housing projects along the transport corridor are yet to be confirmed, but one potential location is the current site of the Rosehill Racecourse. Discussions have begun with the Australian Turf Club (ATC), exploring the potential of relocating Rosehill Racecourse and building up to 25,000 new homes on the current site.
While many Sydneysiders were hoping for a more rapid completion of Metro West to fill the seven kilometre gap between Sydney Olympic Park and Parramatta Metro Stations, the timeline announced today is one that the government have described as realistic and “sustainable”.
“To continue this project without maximising its potential to underpin the construction of thousands of new homes would have been an incredibly wasteful missed opportunity.”
Aiming for a 2032 completion will not only allow time for affordable housing to be built in time for Sydney Metro West to open, it will also avoid the tax premiums that would likely be introduced to fund the construction in a more limited timeframe.
Better public transport and more affordable housing? We're keen, but now we just have to play the waiting game.