South Australia

Albanese continues fight for more trams in Adelaide

SHADOW TRANSPORT MINISTER Anthony Albanese has urged South Australia’s Marshall Government to reevaluate its resistance to light rail in the state’s capital.

Anthony Albanese has for some time been a strong advocate of the AdeLINK project, a proposed network of as many as five tram lines radiating from a city circle line, to connect Adelaide’s CBD to surrounding suburbs.

AdeLINK currently sits on Infrastructure Australia’s list of Priority Initiatives, meaning it is counted by the independent advisor as a potential candidate for federal funding, pending a successful business case.

Labor was, prior to last year’s state election, committed to AdeLINK, and the recently-opened City Tram Extension was built, in part, as a precursor to the largerproject. But the Steven Marshall-led Liberal Party stood firmly in opposition to AdeLINK before the vote and, since winning the election, has maintained its stance. Now Albanese is urging Marshall to reconsider. “I think the State Government needs to have a rethink,” Albanese told FIVEaa Radio in Adelaide in January. “If we’re going to deal with urban congestion, if we’re going to move people around our capital cities, then public transport is the key.” The former deputy prime minister commended the continued work done on the North-South Road Corridor project, but said “light rail really does make sense forAdelaide”.

“[Light rail is] a very efficient way of moving people around. Adelaide has enormous advantages with its wide streets. It’s a well-planned city. [Trams] can coexist with traffic and this occurs, of course, in many places – particularly the world’s largest tram network in Melbourne.”

Adelaide, once home to several tram lines, has since 1958 featured just the Glenelg Line which, recently extended, connects the CBD to Glenelg in the southwest.

Under the AdeLINK plan the Glenelg Line would be incorporated into WestLINK, creating a line between Henley Beach and Glenelg via the CBD, complete with a spur line to the airport.

Along with WestLINK, there would be PortLINK, EastLINK, ProspectLINK and UnleyLINK, all connecting with the

SYDNEY METRO Sydney Metro City & Southwest will include 31km of tunnels. proposed CityLINK tram running in a continuous loop around the CBD.

“Here in Adelaide though you have the prospect of a progressive rollout, so it can be done in an orderly way,” Albanese said during the January 3 interview.

“The fact is that the current Federal Government allocated almost $200 million in its last Budget – not announced but allocated – so the money is there to at least commence the rollout of these projects. The planning work has been done. And I think that would be a very positive thing in terms of improving the liveability of what is already a great city to live in there in Adelaide.”

Albanese went on to accuse the Marshall Government of opposing a good decision on political grounds.

“The concern is that essentially the Marshall Government, it would appear, just opposed a whole range of good initiatives because they were from the other side of politics,” he said.

“And I think what people want to see, particularly when it comes to infrastructure and transport issues, is projects that aren’t the whim of one side of politics. They just want things to be done.”