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Comment by ajxs | Hacker News Reader

I don't feel like anyone has addressed the fact that Sydney's new tram system is an absolute joke. There's no point comparing it to Melbourne's expansive tram network, ours covers less than a tenth of the distance and pretty much runs between UNSW ( incredibly wealthy private institution ) and the new casino ( incredibly wealthy private institution ). The NSW state government has been thumbing it's nose at the ICAC for years with some of shadiest dealing and poor infrastructure investment of little benefit to the public. This new tram network is just the latest in this tradition. You can't possibly say that projects like this, Westconnex, the shortening of the rail line in Newcastle, etc did not reek of corruption and keep a straight face. Admittedly, transport to UNSW was always bad via road. The congestion in the Eastern Suburbs is terrible. I never found the buses to Randwick to be _that_ terrible, but I never rode them in peak hour on a daily basis.

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> I never found the buses to Randwick to be _that_ terrible, but I never rode them in peak hour on a daily basis.

It's very difficult to get a bus towards the city in the south east if you live closer to the city than UNSW - there's no standing room so they don't even stop. Getting a bus home at night after 10pm is a similar story so I end up walking back along the route past Hyde Park since that's where it fills up.

You can also add the stadium to the infrastructure corruption stink-list.

I think your new tram system will be a great improvement on what is there right now (i.e over crowded buses). Maybe I am optimistic because I have witnessed the white elephant that is Newcastle's new 2.1km tram line (that's the next city up the east coast for non-Australians). Newcastle's tram line is a stark reminder that corporate interests can and will rip up heavy rail lines given enough incentives and a sufficiently corrupt state government. By most measures, public transport in Newcastle has gotten worse over the past few years, mostly due to stupid (or maybe just self serving) decisions made by those in charge.

"2.1km"

I hope theres more planned, thats barely worth going out of your way to catch.

Ah there are so many whingers in Australia who hate change! The new tram is much needed and George St is much better off with this than the hellscape of buses and cars. The southeast desperately needs a proper link to the city. As someone who moved from overseas to Sydney, I am excited about the new line, and WestConnex was desperately needed too. I'm grateful for all the infrastructure coming online here. $3 billion for this isn't so bad. You won't find anywhere in the world where projects like this don't have some corruption. Shrug.

The big thing about WestConnex was that it fed many lanes of traffic into a tiny crowded one lane street that has a lot of pedestrian traffic as well.

Maybe that's a bit of NIMBY but generally after new highways are built they are effectively choked off by the roads that feed in and out of them, especially ones where people want to exit on.

I mean, the Harbour Tunnel does that onto S Dowling St, yes, it's congested but still works better than going through the city...

More like there are plenty of people born in Australia or who are longer-term residents than yourself who are jaded after seeing ridiculous developments or promises by successive State and Federal governments.

All that aside, I'm not against reasonable and financially responsible development. In my hometown of Adelaide the recent revival and expansion of the tram lines has been done in a successful and financially responsible manner (IMO): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trams_in_Adelaide

Building between two highly trafficked buildings that can make obscene money off the participants via uni fees or gambling makes sense. Presumably those people are getting some value for their money and making that happen more accessibly is reasonable.

I don't understand the logic that leads to corruption. There might be corruption there for sure, but I'm not sure that reasoning is evidence for it.

Putting tram out to low traffic or density areas wouldn't make sense for your primary lines.

There are other heavily trafficked areas that doesn't have any investment. Esp the poorer western suburbs, with overcrowded trains and few busses.

The tram and light rail investment benefits the property and businesses along the route, but the taxes are paid by the silent majority who derive little to no benefit.

Yeah get those western suburbs solutions too! The second tram line can go there. I'm fairly sure casinos and unis pay taxes too.

I can't get into this base politicking about public services in such a crass way. I was sure Australia was above this nonsense. Go talk to your local rep! Bringing up corruption over not placing tram lines where you want them, is for the Americans. I'm not so easily persuaded that our pollies are that dumb.

Are you joking? Did you miss the fact that NSW Premier Barry O'Farrell dug his heels in and refused to sell Ausgrid infrastructure, then gets thrown out on a dubious corruption charge over a donated bottle of wine? From memory he denied this at first, then changed his tune and bowed out voluntarily. Only to be replaced with Casino Mike Baird who has a fire sale on public infrastructure. He presides over selling the poles and wires, the Westconnex debacle with the amalgamation of uncooperative inner-west councils, the Newcastle train line scandal, all the rest. Then just up and resigns before the end of his term after doing so many highly controversial deals. If you don't smell a rat in NSW politics you're clearly not paying attention.

>NSW politics

I'll give you that. There's more rats in Aussie politics overall. Glad to see the back of Abbott and Barnaby is a parade of comical errors.

This is a good argument, except that the tram line itself is a giant white elephant for the taxpayer. I doubt I'll ever catch it, and I live in the inner city. The allegations of corruption follow from the fact that James Packer decides to build the already controversial casino in Barangaroo, a pokey, poorly trafficked corner of the inner city and then all of a sudden the government pours money into investing in public transport leading straight to the doorstep of the casino. The tram line literally terminates there. I doubt the tram line will benefit even 1% of NSW citizens, yet we footed the bill. It's even more of a lemon than Westconnex.

>James Packer

Both the Packer boy and the Murdoch sons seem to be lemons. Hopefully they improve with age...

Agreed. The fact that it cost _so_ much is part of why we should not have public transport on rails. The money would have far better spent on better and more buses. And dedicated bus lanes and roads.

I have an inside story on the tram (light rail) construction. Workers were hired and literally did nothing for months. No wonder it cost so much.

So the problem is corrupt and lazy managers, not that trams are bad.

Yep, but trains/trams have a romantic aura which is exploited.

And being a fixed high visibility project makes it so much easier to exploit.

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