Labor will promise $1 billion dollars to begin securing a corridor for a high-speed rail link along the East Coast between Brisbane and Melbourne if elected to government.
A high-speed rail link would help improve connectivity between major cities and regions and would stop at key cities including Canberra, Sydney, and Newcastle.
The promised funding would be used to buy a land corridor for the future construction of the route and is a lengthy but essential step towards making the high-speed line a priority.
CEO of the Hunter Business Chamber Bob Hawes says the Newcastle and Hunter region would benefit from a high-speed line with faster rail connections, to Sydney in particular.
"Improved connectivity would also allow the Sydney people to have better access to our region which might have flow on benefits in terms of tourism and business investments, so that is where we see the potential main benefits coming from if such piece of infrastructure was put in place," Mr Hawes said.
Mr Hawes says the region would also benefit from an influx of residential and business investment, enhanced employment options, less road congestion, and better synergies with economic centres in Sydney and other areas along the route although it would take some time, possibly decades, before the benefits could be realised.
Although Mr Hawes welcomes Labor's commitment to securing a rail corridor, he says that it is a long-term solution and work on improving the current rail line between Newcastle and Sydney must continue.
"We certainly think that those two things have to run concurrently because we are of the view that the high speed rail would be some time off compared to the ability for government to be able to do something now to the current link that would make it faster."
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| Newcastle to Sydney Train Service. Image: Transport NSW |
