A multi-billion-dollar project to improve public rail services, speed up travel, and ultimately double the number of services from Beenleigh to the Gold Coast is in the works.
Property acquisition notices have been issued, suggesting work is firmly on the agenda.
But there’s a window of opportunity for people to have their say, until October 29.
“Extensive research and planning has been undertaken in designing the proposed route for the Logan and Gold Coast Faster Rail project,” a Translink spokesperson said.
“Faster” rail however, is not to be confused with “fast rail” which was a plan being proposed by Queensland Council of Mayors in their bid to bring the 2032 Olympics to Brisbane – a plan to ensure travel from Brisbane to Toowoomba, the Gold Coast and Sunshine Coast was no more than 45 minutes.
This plan would straighten the bends in tracks to make travel faster, add extra lines to ensure extra services could be accommodated, and it would evaluate the best places for crossings and stations.
“Alternative options such as tunnelling or building a new train line would have been costly without addressing local transport needs and would still cause similar impacts elsewhere,” the Translink spokesperson said.
“Expanding the existing rail corridor balances improved rail services with minimising impacts on properties and surrounding local areas.”
Logan City Council’s infrastructure chair Teresa Lane said she was impressed by the standard of consultation being offered, especially via the online tool where residents can instantly submit suggested changes detailed on a map.
“I think as a consultation tool it’s pretty much above average,” she said.
In the first week since opening, the interactive map garnered 129 responses from the community which are free to view.
“When people put their views in, if they’ve read the full proposal there’s opportunities, whether it is the crossings, the stations or the connectivity to community, there are so many ways in which residents can feed back their views on this,” Cr Lane said.
Community consultation is open until October 29. In addition to taking online submissions, the department of transport will engage impacted residents and run nine pop-ups at stations from Kuraby to Beenleigh from now to October 14.
At the start of September, residents along the proposed corridor were notified that their houses fall in the line of development but Translink would not comment on how many homes would be impacted.
A TransLink spokesperson said property acquisitions were an inevitable consequence given the project’s scale.
“Unfortunately, to complete the scale of work along this 20km suburban corridor, we do need to partially or fully acquire properties that are nearby the existing rail corridor,” the spokesperson said.
Red Tape Busters director Shane Bowering said preliminary acquisition notices do not mean fait accompli.
“It’s not a done deal, it might not even go ahead, but what it’s saying to them is ‘look, get ready because this might well happen,’” he said.
“In the meantime, if you are the owner of the property and they do acquire it, then you’ve got avenue for compensation.”
Mr Bowering said as part of submissions to community consultation, it is helpful for as many residents as possible to express their views. Additionally, they should wherever possible include suggestions for alternative routes with details on why they should be considered.
“What you need to do is try and outline why you don’t think this is right, or why the direction of the rail corridor and maybe provide alternatives that the government may be able to consider,” he said.
“Also get as many other people as possible on board who might be in a similar position.”
