Sean Bonham, Executive General Manager of ACCIONA\u2019s Specialist Businesses, has said he doesn\u2019t think a high-speed rail network between Melbourne and Sydney will happen \u201cin his lifetime\u201d. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Speaking at the Civil Contractors Federation Victoria Road and Rail Sector Outlook Breakfast on June 24, Bonham argued that while he would love to see it come to fruition, he\u2019s not sure the money is there. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cMy only criticism of the Suburban Rail Loop is that it probably stops some of the other things that need to be done, it\u2019s such a big project,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cHigh speed rail would be a super expensive project and I don\u2019t know if we can afford it. Do we need it? Yes, and anyone who has travelled in Europe \u2013 what a way to go.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cBut we\u2019re going to be talking hundreds of billions of dollars.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Bonham noted that a lot of corridors and farmland would also be needed for a high-speed network, which would be controversial. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI think some big decisions are going to get made,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cSydney \u2013 Newcastle might get built in my lifetime, but I don\u2019t see the other ones happening for 50 to 100 years, unfortunately.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Bonham, who has 40 years of experience in the railway industry, added that he supports the Suburban Rail Loop. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI think we take a very short-term view of our lives,\u201d he said. \u201cMelbourne is growing at a rate of knots, so it\u2019s really exciting times but it puts a lot of pressure on our infrastructure. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve got to have this decision in Victoria about whether we keep growing out or whether we start to grow up. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI think the Suburban Rail Loop is a real challenge for us mentally, to actually start focusing on what that looks like.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Rail Express<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Bonham, who has 40 years of experience in the railway industry, added that he supports the Suburban Rail Loop.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":21,"featured_media":242044,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[273,999,35,7665,47],"tags":[993,5026,10376,2139,8],"class_list":["post-242043","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-australia","category-australia-politics","category-breaking-news","category-high-speed-rail-2","category-rail-news","tag-melbourne","tag-nsw","tag-rail-express","tag-sydney","tag-victoria"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242043","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/21"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=242043"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242043\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":242045,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242043\/revisions\/242045"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/242044"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=242043"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=242043"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=242043"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}