The NSW government’s industrial dispute with rail unions over the new intercity trains is tipped to add hundreds of millions of dollars to costs on Australia’s largest infrastructure project that has already blown out by billions.
But even without overruns pushing the cost of the driverless-train project to more than A$55 billion, the economics of the “Sydney Metro” project are questionable – in particular the decision to cannibalise parts of the existing Sydney train network to create one of the four planned automated routes.
