About 25 years ago, Bruce Ashley was walking beside the Hawthorne canal in Sydney’s inner west when he stopped to chat with two men planting native species next to the footpath.
Ashley, an environmental planning consultant, had been thinking about how to link paths and scraps of bush to create a “greenway” along the old goods line from Pyrmont to Dulwich Hill since the mid-1990s, when the state government had commissioned him to examine the potential for cycle rail trails throughout New South Wales.
“I was exploring around Parramatta Road and I thought, if you could get under here, and link up another bit of path, and join a few other bits together, you could link Cooks River to Iron Cove,” he says.
He discussed his ideas with the men by the canal, and that meeting helped nudge him into action.
“I went home, and within about 20 minutes I’d sketched out what the greenway could consist of.”
That 20-minute dream has taken 20-plus years to realise but it will become a reality next weekend when the GreenWay (as it’s now officially named) is finally opened.
On Sunday 14 December the fences will come down and the missing links on the 6km route of separated paths will open, with formal celebrations planned in Johnson Park at Dulwich Hill.
People will be able to walk, run or ride from Iron Cove on the Parramatta River to the Cooks River almost entirely off-road, following the route of the light rail built along the old rail corridor and the canal.
New tunnels or underpasses duck beneath five roads, including the six lanes of Parramatta Road where, until now, cyclists had to take the stairs or lift to cross via the light rail bridge. The GreenWay also includes 10 pieces of public art, mostly in the tunnels.
The mayor of Inner West council, Darcy Byrne, says the GreenWay will “transform the way that people travel in the inner west”, connecting “two of Sydney’s great waterways”.
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By the end of 2026 it will also connect to the metro at Dulwich Hill, when the extension from Sydenham to Bankstown opens.
“People won’t really understand until the GreenWay is opened and the metro complements it just how this will change travel in our community for the better,” Byrne says.
Compared with the billions spent on WestConnex freeways and Sydney’s metro lines, the $57m price tag for the GreenWay seems like small change. But the new route could unlock huge benefits for those using the city’s frustratingly piecemeal cycle network.
From the south end of the GreenWay, the existing Cooks River path extends east to Brighton-le-Sands and west towards Olympic Park. At the northern end, an unfriendly stretch along Lilyfield Road is all that stands in the way of an almost seamless connection to the central business district and Centennial Park in the east or over the Harbour Bridge and its new access ramp, also due to open imminently.
The head of Bicycle NSW, Peter McLean, says the GreenWay is “a beautiful piece of connectivity”.
“It’s been a project a long time in the making, but it really is fantastic to see it come to fruition,” he says. “It will increase those linkages across broader Sydney as well, so it’s not just a benefit for the people in the inner west.”
But the GreenWay to open next Sunday is not exactly as its proponents, including Ashley, envisaged.
‘Hugely impressive’
Parts of the corridor were identified in the late 1980s, when the state government’s “greening the grey spots” urban beautification program earmarked the Hawthorne canal for revegetation.
The GreenWay’s long gestation is linked to the gradual conversion of the goods line into the current L1 light rail.
Ashley originally conceived a corridor housing a single rail track for part of the southern end of the line, with a relatively narrow bike path that would leave intact areas of bush already under regeneration.
For years, he worked a couple of days a week pro bono, engaging with community groups and promoting the plan to the four local councils involved (three subsequently merged to form Inner West council) and the state government. Rejuvenating neglected urban green spaces was as important as the transport corridor.
“The idea was you create an environment that’s as high in quality as a national park but a different experience. [People would say] ‘Oh, the inner city, that’s dreadful, you have to go off to the national park to experience the environment.’ What I thought would be great was if you could have that same experience but you’re involved in it locally.”
By 2009, there was a public masterplan but, two years later, the then-transport minister, Gladys Berejiklian, shelved the concept amid fears of a cost overrun for the full extension of the light rail, which was not completed until 2014.
It took several more years to revive funding and it wasn’t until 2018 that a new masterplan was unveiled. With the double-track light rail now filling the corridor, the plan necessitated a more elaborate path outside that envelope, involving tunnels and underpasses.
“It’s hugely impressive what they are building – far more than I had envisaged,” Ashley says.
The greater ambition came with the loss of some sections of replanted bush, and at a higher cost. But still, “for a 20th the cost of WestConnex you could build 50 greenways throughout Sydney,” Ashley says.
‘We need these green spaces’
Monica Wangmann, a former independent member of Ashfield council, was a longtime GreenWay advocate, but now argues that the light rail extension was a mistake that ushered in “over-development” of the former flour mills around Lewisham into hundreds of units.
“It was supposed to be a bushcare corridor,” Wangmann says. “But the whole thing with the light rail line was about putting in high-rise around it.”
Wangmann says the concept of the GreenWay was “trashed” to build a “whole suburb”.
There are 239 different species in the corridor, including 10 that are threatened, the former councillor says. “But when push comes to shove, environmental issues get put aside for other agendas.”
Byrne insists the “green” part of the GreenWay has not been neglected.
“It’s really important we don’t forget the … biodiversity components,” he says. “A lot of the people who advocated for the project from the start are bushcare volunteers, who have continued to work away at trying to revegetate the corridor over many years.
“We need to provide them with the ongoing support to continue to expand the biodiversity.”
McLean agrees that protecting the corridor as green space is an important end in itself.
“When we’re building more houses, increasing density … we need these green spaces to soften up our suburbs and connect them not just by black pieces of tar,” he says.
Ashley says now that the engineering work is completed, he wants to refocus on the vegetation. His vision was never “build this and you’re done”.
The community needs to be involved “to help improve and understand their area”.
“It’s very rewarding to feel you can contribute – rather than whinging about stuff.”
