High-speed rail link between Sydney and Newcastle could be ‘shovel-ready’ in two years, Albanese government says | Australian politics
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2026/feb/23/high-speed-rail-australia-sydney-newcastle-link
High-speed rail link between Sydney and Newcastle could be ‘shovel-ready’ in two years, Albanese government says | Australian politics
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2026/feb/23/high-speed-rail-australia-sydney-newcastle-link
25 Comments
[The Silver Emu](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8av3knflbQo)!
2 years? So roughly about when they start to trot out the same promise do the next election?
Another 15 until Melbourne gets an airport rail.
> I know that the Japanese government essentially, and Japanese companies are very interested in playing a role. We have to take pressure off our capital cities as well, and one way to do that is to have good regional economic development, and high-speed rail can be very much a part of that.”
I mean if there was ever a country to copy train homework from it’s Japan. Such a pleasant way to get around and the length of their tip to tip rail system is the same size as the east coast so it’s not an impossible amount of rail to build
ive been hearing “bullet train” promises thingy since when john howard was in control
Shovel ready in two years seems pretty good.
Are they deliberately trying to copy Utopia at this point?
In other news, I could be “power-ball ready” this Thursday night! I think my chance of winning powerball is higher than this thing actually getting built.
Wow. We are definitely leading the world……
The 1,318 km Beijing-Shanghai High-Speed Railway was built in approximately 38 months (starting April 2008, opening June 2011), while the 2,298 km Beijing-Guangzhou line was completed in just seven years.
We could have had high speed rail across ALL of Australia 25 years ago if we nationalised all our oil, gas and mineral wealth.
CFMEU agree. The timing will suit them nicely.
Maybe it’s a start to a bigger project but surely it’s a very limited use case as it stands.
For me who lives in the outer suburbs of Sydney it would be near as much hassle getting to Central then on the high speed train as it would be just driving the 2 hours and having the car.
Edit: and projections of 1 hour travel between Sydney and Newcastle isn’t that fast. Brisbane to Melbourne via Sydney would take nearly 12 hours at that speed. Sure it’s faster than driving but most are going to take a 2 hour flight.
If they use a shovel, it’s going to take ages.
Shovel ready? Didn’t know there was a stage called that.
As much as I’d be proud to ride a bullet train here, I’d much rather billions spent on: high capacity trams and metros, as well as more frequent buses on faster routes, as well as safer cycleways and safer pedestrian crossings.
Oh, and land use changes underwritten with loan guarantees near to these transport improvements.
Where? Not just Newcastle, but everywhere.
To clarify here is what he means: [The Shovel — News you can believe in](https://theshovel.com.au/)
It took nearly 40 years to get a second airport , maybe a ‘shovel turning ceremony’ with a nice pamphlet.
better than nothing!
It would cost us probably 1/10 the price to just overhaul the existing infrastructure and create a faster usable train network.
No one’s ever going to use a bullet train from Sydney to Melbourne. Think about what the ticket price is going to be to try and get money back on this thing. And then ask why anyone’s going to bother with this over a flight?
When instead we could just rebuild the current rail network. Flatten and straighten the track, more changeover points and new trains to add to the system. Trains right now are averaging maybe 80-90km/h. And they could be going so much faster already if we fixed this.
You could have express trains running easily 150+ doing the reduced stops between the major cities. Like Sydney, Newcastle, Taree, Port, Lismore, Goldcoast, Brisbane for example. You’ve just knocked off an hour right there having the train stop half as often.
Then have smaller services branching out from there to pick up all the nearby towns that gets missed.
Sleeper trains could be an actual low carbon alternative to flying for the bigger hops. Sure it’s going to take you 6-10 hours. But you’ll be on a comfortable modern train. You can relax or just sleep through it.
If this bullet train does ever actually get built. It will be under utilised. Worst of all the level of new infrastructure that’s going to be required to fucking build the thing. It’s not going to be a positive environmental impact. If the patronage isn’t amazing it may never even break even. Might as well just keep flying.
And finally for all the egg heads saying oh we need to broaden the range of access into the cities. How much data do we need before we realise that sprawling further from Sydney and Melbourne isn’t solving anything.
We need to connect useful hubs of diversified industry. Not this ridiculous game of centralisation while everyone’s moving further away and jobs stay in the majors.
I grew up in Newcastle and I was back there recently. If the idea is to unlock access between Sydney they’re a decade too late. Looking at house prices and the expressway. Newcastle’s already been flooded through with Sydneysiders trying to beat the market.
“Shovel ready” is political talk for all promises no action. It’s should be rephrased to shoveling bullshit.
If this $90 billion Sydney boondoggle gets built, I will not hear another fucking word about Victorian infrastructure spending.
I am the most pro public transportation person out there but just give up on this 😂
“The federal High Speed Rail Authority is planning for a rail network to connect Brisbane, Sydney, Canberra, Melbourne and regional communities in between.” Yes. We need this. Also some competition for the airlines.
as if
C’mon yassss make it happen in my lifetime!
It’s just another distraction from the housing crisis, which they actually have a potential basic solution to with all the barracks that the Defence Department are currently selling off.