Action for Public Transport (N.S.W.) Inc.

	P O Box K606
	Haymarket NSW 1240
	14 December 2018

8931 F6 Extension Stage 1

Submission on Environmental Impact Statement

Action for Public Transport (NSW) is a transport advocacy group active in Sydney since 1974. We promote the interests of beneficiaries of public transport - both of passengers and the wider community. We make this submission on the Stage 1 New M5 Arncliffe to President Avenue Kogarah EIS dated October 2018.

Generally, we are strongly opposed to this project. We think that public transport alternatives should have been considered. We were appalled to read in The Sydney Morning Herald an article dated 10 April 2017 entitled "F6 planners told to ignore public transport, build roads, documents show" which reports the existence of a cabinet directive not to consider public transport alternatives to the F6 project. This stage 1 project is part of a larger F6 scheme extending further south. Public transport alternatives which could have been and which should be considered include schemes like:

Instead of the disruptive conversion of the Sydenham to Bankstown (or thereabouts) railway to metro, construct a new metro southwards from Sydenham, serving areas such as Brighton-le-sands, Ramsgate, Sans Souci, Sylvania, Miranda (interchange station) and Caringbah South.
Construct a new rail tunnel from about Waterfall to Thirroul, greatly expanding the capacity of the Illawarra line to carry passengers between Sydney, the Illawarra and the Shoalhaven areas.

We should not have to remind the Department of Planning and Environment that public transport expansion in and around Sydney is a prime objective in government transport policies. We point out that public transport expansion schemes such as those two listed above could produce all the claimed benefits of the current project described in EIS section 1.3 (page 1-3).

We note that section 5.1.2, entitled Alternative 2 - Rail infrastructure improvements seems dismissive of rail's possibilities and may have been written in response to a directive to preclude public transport alternatives. It includes statements like "Demand for mobility by road travel is forecast to continue to grow" and makes clear that active consideration of public transport development around the region is ten or more years away. Obviously, construction is still further into the future.

We press for this stage and indeed the whole F6 Extension project to be called off in favour of immediate public transport expansion, preferably heavy rail.

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