Page 3592 - Week 11 - Thursday, 23 October 2014
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What is more, the people who live on Northbourne Avenue now and the people who will live on Northbourne Avenue in the future will be served very well by the many bus services. In actual fact there are 165 bus services which go from Gungahlin to the city each day. Between 7 am and 9 am, there is a bus every three minutes. I commend ACTION for the way they service the Gungahlin town centre to the city service. I commend them, because that is a very well-serviced route in the network. I think there is relatively high satisfaction with the red rapid services.
This begs the question: why would you replace the most profitable bus system with an extremely unprofitable light rail system? At best, the light rail system is going to bring in $3 million, $4 million, $5 million or at most $6 million in revenue; yet we are spending in availability payments probably $100 million over 20 years. The revenue is $3 million or $4 million; the expenditure is $100 million.
There is a reason the private sector are not particularly interested in equity in this project unless they get a massive subsidy, perhaps to the tune of $100 million a year. The government will get $3 million in revenue. This is an appalling proposition for the taxpayers of Canberra and it is an appalling proposition for the vast majority of residents of Canberra when it comes to transport.
Let us look again at the electorate of Ginninderra. What is going to happen to the many people who use Ginninderra Drive or Barry Drive and want to turn right from Ginninderra Drive onto Ellenborough Street? If the tram is going to be the priority, the backlog on Ellenborough is going to get even worse. That is exactly what the government reports have said, that traffic gets worse around light rail, not better. It gets worse around light rail.
Not only will the other residents of Canberra not be serviced by light rail but their road links are actually going to get worse as well. They are going to be paying more and having a worse quality of life as a result of this. This is an appalling proposition for Canberrans, and we will fight it. We will fight it.
I think it is absolutely outrageous that the government could spend so much money without even assessing the other routes. How is it that nobody on the other side has stood up and said, “Why didn’t they assess Tuggeranong to the city? Why didn’t they assess Belconnen to the city? Why didn’t they assess city to the airport, or city to the inner south or city to Woden or whatever? Why was it done on a political basis?” It is an appalling decision and the Canberra Liberals will do all we can to fight this ridiculous expenditure.
MR RATTENBURY (Molonglo) (4.01): I would like to thank Ms Berry for bringing this matter of public importance to the Assembly because, despite Mr Coe’s surprise, I think it actually is worth while to continue to talk about this so that we can address some of the questions that are being put forward in the public space and take the opportunity to make the case and dispel some of the myths that are being propagated by those who choose to be sceptical about this, for reasons that suit them.
Let me start with a couple of quotes about light rail:
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