New Rail Line Proposed For Melbourne’s North West
A train line is expected would help ease congestion arising from an influx of 3000 new homes, within a new 128-hectare suburb, on former Department of Defence land, off Cordite Avenue, and bound by the Maribyrnong River, which the State Government approved last month (Melways reference 27, J7).
Mr Chamberlain said the train line had the potential to take thousands of cars off inner-city streets.
“This section of the railway (off the Newmarket train station, on the Broadmeadows line) is scandalously under-utilised given it is dual track and it is used two periods a year at the spring racing carnival and the royal show,” Mr Chamberlain told The Age.
He said that with an existing rail line for 60 per cent of the distance to the city, a rail link to the new suburb was a prospect worth considering.
He added the investment would increase land values of the newly approved 128-hectare suburb, which would be an investment to the government, which would sell the land.
New train stations would be built at Highpoint Shopping Centre, Victoria University, and possibly East Keilor, where another disused rail line exists. It’s been speculated that disused rail line, visible from the Western Ring Road, will form part of a rail link from Melbourne Airport, to Footscray in the long term.
Public Transport Users Association president Daniel Bowen said “Highpoint Shopping Centre, like most of our shopping centres is flooded with cars – shoppers driving around looking for parking”. He said a new train line through the north-western suburbs would make sense.