REGIONAL councils fighting to have the Blayney to Demondrille rail line reopened have told the NSW Government that they need a decision before June 30 if they are to secure the freight needed to make the line economical.
Councillors and staff from Harden, Cowra, Grenfell, Young and Boorowa met with the NSW Minister for Roads and Ports, Duncan Gay, and Member for Burrinjuck Katrina Hodgkinson at a mayoral round table in Boorowa last week to outline their case for reopening the line.
The councils presented the Minister with a report outlining the case for the reopening.
The report was complied by the Cowra Ministerial Taskforce, which was established in March 2010 to oversee the development of a business case for the revival of sustainable services on the Cowra lines.
The report estimated that it could cost up to $30 million to reopen the line.
The taskforce was chaired by the deputy director general of Transport Policy and Planning, representatives of NSW Industry and Investment, the mayor of Cowra, Bill West, and the mayor of Weddin Shire, Maurice Simpson. Harden councillor Tony Madden was also a member of the taskforce.
The taskforce was set up in March 2010 after a meeting between the Minister for Transport and the five councils.
The report they presented said that the paper manufacturer Visy Industries had said it would use the line to transport its timber from Bathurst and Oberon to its mills in Tumut.
Under this plan Visy would truck its logs to the rail line in Bathurst, and move the logs via rail to Cootamundra and then truck the logs to Tumut.
Currently Visy is transporting some 200,000 tonnes a year of timber from the Bathurst area to Tumut and expected to be doing so for the next 20 years. This task required 15 b-doubles operating on a continuous cycle.
The Cootamundra Shire Council, which was represented at the meeting, supported this concept and outlined its plans for a strategic rail hub network in Cootamundra that would incorporate the Blayney Demondrille line.
Cootamundra Shire Council general manager Ken Trethewey told the meeting that all local and regional roads were deteriorating and that councils did not have the funds to counteract this decline.
For this reason, and the fact that freight levels were expected to double in 15 years, it was essential to get more freight back on rail to relieve the pressure on the roads.
He said road freight costs were expected to increase by 22 per cent by 2015, whereas rail freight costs were projected to rise by 10 per cent and that by 2020 road freight costs would increase by about 53 per cent and rail by about 30 per cent.
The meeting was told that Visy would need a decision as to whether the line would be reopened by June 30 as that was the company had to renegotiate its long-term trucking contracts.
Cr Madden said proposal for reopening the line stacked up as a viable proposition and that it made good economic sense as well as helping road safety.
Mr Gay told the meeting that his department would now evaluate the report.
“We will be quick,” he said, “but we will be careful.”
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