Private plans for light rail to revive Sydney’s Parramatta Road

The unsightly arterial Rd. has attracted an unfortunate nickname, Sydney's Varicose Vein. Most of the shops here are closed and it's tired and dead and it's the main gateway into the city. So it's not a very good advertisement for Sydney and it has some powerful detractors. When you drive down Parramatta Rd. you think, is that the best we can do? And yet plans to revive Parramatta Rd. have a history of going nowhere, including in 2013. This is the State Government's vision, and 2017. The Inner W Council now says it has a $200 million solution. The latest proposal is from Ultrac, the consortium that built the CBD and SE light rail. The line would start at Taverners Hill in the inner West and run along Parramatta Rd. to connect with Central Station before passing through Redfern, Waterloo and Zetland to reach Green Square. You know how Sydney versus our, they're not quite consistent around here, so probably light rails going to be much reliable. Sydney Lord Mayor Clover Moore is proposing her council stump up $100 million for the project. Successive governments have talked about their renaissance of Parramatta Road and done nothing. The plans proponents say it would help the state government address the shortage of homes in Sydney by encouraging the development of high density housing along Parramatta Rd. The Premier told a room full of developers he wasn't interested. We've got a very big transport infrastructure program but it's expensive. That's despite all tracks offer to pay the upfront building costs and then the NSW government will pay when the services are actually up and running and that would lock us into a contract for many years. With one supplier, the government, putting the brakes on the idea.