It is increasingly clear that we need more public transport to reduce air-polluting travel and provide much-needed sustainable jobs.
But state governments are captive to the road industry. The result is poor planning, expanding and expensive road tolls and more carbon pollution.
The following is the Socialist Alliance’s Sustainable Transport policy — an example of what an alternative transport plan could look like.
***
“We’re mad as hell and we’re not taking it anymore!” Mary Court, secretary of the Penrith Valley Combined Unions (PVCU) and No M4 Toll, told the Don’t Mess With the West rally on February 16.
“Western Sydney will rise up; we’re not a dumping ground for Sydney’s problems”, Court said. “The ‘toll tax’ on the M4 Motorway is an assault … We are being forced to pay this M4 toll until 2060, increasing at a rate much higher than inflation, to pay for the Coalition state government’s cost blow-outs elsewhere.
Residents from Annandale and Rozelle, in Sydney’s inner west, protested against WestConnex on February 15. The controversial $17 billion WestConnex tollway is set to destroy a much-used park and cycle track in the area.
The inability of the Liberal Party to find candidates for Hunter seats for the March New South Wales state election suggests that even its party faithful recognise that Gladys Berejiklian’s Coalition government is headed for electoral defeat and, probably, a total wipe-out in the Hunter.
The suburbs along this line are some of the fastest growing in Melbourne. Yet, the state Labor government has refused to invest in the infrastructure required to meet the community’s growing needs.
The Penrith Valley Community Unions (PVCU) held a protest against the WestConnex M4 toll on October 26. About 50 people gathered in Triangle Park and then marched to the nearby electoral office of Penrith Liberal MP and NSW Minister for WestConnex Stuart Ayres.
More than 100 people rallied near Regents Park train station on October 20 to demand the Gladys Berejiklian Coalition government restore the Inner West rail line and maintain the T3 Bankstown line, which it plans to replace with a privatised Metro service.
Experts have rejected claims by the new CEO of the controversial $17 billion WestConnex tollway that halting Stage 3 of the project would necessarily cost taxpayers “billions” and have a “detrimental” impact on local neighbourhoods.
Early submissions to the NSW Parliamentary Inquiry into the Impact of the WestConnex Project, which began on October 9, have already exposed the disastrous environmental and social effects of the controversial $17 billion WestConnex tollway.
About 100 people attended an election forum on transport in the Moreland local council area with some candidates on September 27. The Victorian election is on November 24.
The Victorian road lobby is at it again. Fresh from being defeated on the East-West Link, the rent-seeking tollroad builders have been given a construction gift in the form of a massive new project in Melbourne’s east.
In case you didn't have enough, here's 13 reasons for throwing out the NSW Coalition in the state elections next March.
The WestConnex privatisation “involves arguably the biggest misuse of public funds for corporate gain in Australian history”, Sydney University transport analyst Chris Standen wrote on September 3.
Standen was commenting on the August 31 announcement by the New South Wales Coalition government that it was selling off 51% of the controversial WestConnex tollway complex to a Transurban-led consortium for $9.3 billion.
“We owe it to future generations to do our best to halt this disastrous project,” Greens MLA for Newtown Jenny Leong told an August 22 public meeting about the controversial $17 billion WestConnex tollway project.
According to Monash University professor Chris Nash, who also addressed the meeting, "It is not too late to stop this project".
About 500 people bearing handmade lanterns and banners marched through Sydney on August 11 to protest the state Coalition government's multi-billion dollar transport privatisation and road tollway scams.
International students handed over thousands of signed petitions calling for travel concessions for international students to Greens MLC Mehreen Faruqi outside state parliament on August 14.
New South Wales is the only state that does not provide travel concessions for international students.
