Canberra Railway Station

Staff at Kingston Railway Station, Mike and Natalie, are to be congratulated for their efficiency and courtesy. On Wednesday, 22nd November, 2017, I had a Medical Emergency. Mike handled the booking, while Natalie communicated with the Ambulance. After treatment at Canberra Hospital, I returned for the last train to Sydney. Again, Mike handled the booking. I was most impressed with the service received. I would suggest, if not feeling well, don’t board the train. The staff will help in every way possible.

justsomeaussie said :

c_c™ said :

Eastlake/Causeway was home to Canberra’s first industrial area and tips. They coaxed the tenants out, moving them to the railway adjacent part of Fyshwick and built straight over the top. The cost of remediating the area is astronomical. It’s heavily contaminated, well beyond just asbestos. The word from Planning this year, is unless the Commonwealth chips in a lot, then Eastlake isn’t on the horizon. The cost of remediation alone will be more than it will cost to build the public works component of the City to the Lake plan.

If this is the case, then what on earth is the Territory Government doing letting anyone live at the Causeway at all? Surely it’s a litigators dream to have people in Government housing sitting on contaminated land.

Generally speaking if it’s left undisturbed and buried, there’s negligible risk, not counting of course the longer term implications of chemicals like hydrocarbons and electrical oils entering the water table or nearby waterways. Disturbing it for construction is the problem. And since an area quite a bit bigger than The Causeway, on the lake/wetlands side of the existing housing is formerly a tip for all grades of waste, it could be more than just some top layer soil needing remediation.

Roundhead89 said :

It seems that the correct term is “railroad station”. My copy of Webster’s dictionary has no entry for “railway station” or even “railway”.

You’re clearly not aware that Webster’s is an American dictionary. To paraphrase Churchill, America and Australia are two countries separated by a common language.

davo101 said :

Two things:

1. Thank you for calling it a railway station. I’m stick of numpties calling them train stations.
2. There is a long-term plan to move the station to the western side of the Monaro Highway.

It seems that the correct term is “railroad station”. My copy of Webster’s dictionary has no entry for “railway station” or even “railway”.

c_c™ said :

Eastlake/Causeway was home to Canberra’s first industrial area and tips. They coaxed the tenants out, moving them to the railway adjacent part of Fyshwick and built straight over the top. The cost of remediating the area is astronomical. It’s heavily contaminated, well beyond just asbestos. The word from Planning this year, is unless the Commonwealth chips in a lot, then Eastlake isn’t on the horizon. The cost of remediation alone will be more than it will cost to build the public works component of the City to the Lake plan.

If this is the case, then what on earth is the Territory Government doing letting anyone live at the Causeway at all? Surely it’s a litigators dream to have people in Government housing sitting on contaminated land.

All very interesting.

A few points. Many train travellers are pensioners spending just $2.50 one-way. That doesn’t give a lot of financial return. Student fares are also substantially less than regular fares. I doubt the buses to/from the train station are much cop, given some of the times it leaves and arrives, unless you live on that bus route.

The fares are much less than air travel, and when you add in the cost and time of travel to the airport, parking, checkin, baggage retrieval, and travel onwards to your actual destination, it is much much cheaper and doesn’t take much longer. It is the poor frequency of trains that becomes the impediment.

I asked Shane Rattenbury the other day about the service, and he thinks the ACT Government has nothing to do with it. Therein lies the problem – if the NSW Govt, is carrying the whole cost, then ACT will get no say. I suggest people write to Shane asking questions. A few mil shaved off the light rail project could make an enormous difference.

Maybe the Snows would agree to fund the moving of the station to the airport precinct, so regional NSW people could catch the train to catch a plane.

P.s. if the Canberra train went to Sydney Airport, that would also be useful. Changing with baggage is a pain.

The proposed light rail would have made more sense if the first leg was going to connect to the railway station (which, BTW, is actually more geographically central than Civic – it’s just that inner northerners try to pretend the southside doesn’t exist!).

But I guess then everyone would have asked why we are not getting a proper under/overground heavy rail system (like Sydney. Melbourne, Brisbane, etc). Sydney has built railway lines under the city, eg Eastern Suburbs line, train line to Sydney airport (around the time of the Olympics).

justsomeaussie said :

c_c™ said :

Yeah, um, no. ACTPLA is using the word “renewal” for East Lake these days, and knowing what they know, don’t hold your breath for anything significant happening with that. Maybe some stuff close to Wentworth Ave but anything else won’t be feasible.

Can you elaborate any further? I thought they were always using the word Urban Renewal the entire time but the intention was to pull down the Causeway houses and rezone the entire area medium to high density residential with a school.

I know the edge of First Edition has been stagnate for some time and I thought it was to do with asbestos contamination but it’s hard to get a peep out of anyone.

Any input on East Lake at all would be great.

Eastlake/Causeway was home to Canberra’s first industrial area and tips. They coaxed the tenants out, moving them to the railway adjacent part of Fyshwick and built straight over the top. The cost of remediating the area is astronomical. It’s heavily contaminated, well beyond just asbestos. The word from Planning this year, is unless the Commonwealth chips in a lot, then Eastlake isn’t on the horizon. The cost of remediation alone will be more than it will cost to build the public works component of the City to the Lake plan.

The future of Kingston Railway Station is part of the East Lake development plan. This has been held up because it will cost $100M + to clean up the toxic waste on the site. The ACT treasury is dependent on land sales so it is keen to sell the land. THE ESA Report is here: http://narrabundah.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/Eastlake-Final-Report-ESA-Stage-1-19-Oct-2005-alias.pdf

The ACT Railway Masterplan report is here: http://www.actpla.act.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0019/16354/Railway_Masterplan_Report.pdf

Minister Corbell tweeted to me @ACTVCC that the new light rail gauge has yet to be determined but un-likely to be same as heavy gauge. So light rail will not be integrated with the line at Kingston Railway Station. Therefore, the scene is being set to get rid of the station and the line. The NSW Liberals would prefer to sell off country railway as it is very costly to maintain.
I have a small pocket history of early rail in the ACT here: http://narrabundah.org.au/?page_id=926

I have heard rumours that they want to place the railway Station Here: https://maps.google.com.au/?ll=-35.320144,149.155031&spn=0.002996,0.004128&t=h&z=19

Bunnings at present own the land.