Passenger

Pros & cons

The current path vs the MMA plan.

Cons: the existing system and current trajectory. Pros: the integrated MMA corridor programme.

Cons of the current system & plan

No high-speed rail anywhere in Australia

Despite 50 years of proposals, Australia has zero kilometres of operating high-speed rail. The HSRA proposes $55-90 billion for 191 km of Sydney-Newcastle coastal HSR - 60% in tunnel on prime built-up land, passenger only, no freight.

Short-haul aviation is the only viable option

Sydney-Melbourne and Sydney-Brisbane are dominated by short-haul flights with airport queues, security, and weather disruption. Genuine ground transport competition does not exist.

Regional cities are not commutable

Newcastle, Wollongong, Goulburn, and the Hunter Valley are 1.5-3 hours by car from Sydney CBD. Commuting from a regional city to a capital is not viable for a working family. Housing affordability suffers because supply expansion is bottlenecked into already-crowded capitals.

Coastal rail lines degraded by freight overload

Sydney-Brisbane coastal rail has been described as the most serious bottleneck on the east coast. Decades of dual-use freight and passenger have left the line below modern passenger standards. Genuine upgrade is impossible without diverting the freight elsewhere.

Capital cities choking under unmanaged population growth

Sydney and Melbourne are forecast to add 2.5-3 million people each over the next 30 years on existing infrastructure that is already strained. Housing prices and rents continue to escalate. No effective decentralisation mechanism is in place.

Existing rail rolling stock manufacturing hollowed out

Australia imports the majority of its rail rolling stock. Sovereign capability to manufacture passenger trainsets, signalling, and traction systems at scale has eroded over decades. Future expansion depends on foreign supply chains.

Pros of the MMA plan

Maglev beats the plane door-to-door

Newcastle to Sydney in 15 minutes. Sydney to Melbourne in 90 minutes. Melbourne to Brisbane in under four hours. Faster than commercial aviation for every east-coast city pair once airport access and security are counted.

Carried on shared corridor infrastructure

Maglev rides on the same MMC viaduct as freight, the aqueduct, HVDC, and hyperloop reservation. Capital cost spread across multiple services. No separate corridor acquisition, no parallel build, no community fight over land.

Regional cities become commutable

30-minute maglev journeys from Sydney to Newcastle, Goulburn, and the Hunter Valley make regional living a genuine alternative for working families. Housing affordability solved by geographic expansion that finally works.

Decarbonises short-haul aviation

Tens of millions of annual flight legs replaced by zero-direct-emission electrified service. The single largest opportunity to cut aviation emissions in Australia.

Coastal passenger lines finally upgraded

With freight migrated inland, the coastal rail corridor is finally available for genuine passenger upgrade - the use case the existing track was built for, not the freight overload that has degraded it.

Sovereign passenger transport manufacturing

Australian-built maglev trainsets, traction systems, and signalling on a 20-year procurement schedule. A passenger-transport manufacturing base that outlasts the construction programme.

Cost and Return Summary

The dollar case for Passenger

CapexPassenger maglev capex sits inside the corridor build — maglev guideway and stations on the Phase 0 spine ($138–257 B) and across the network. Maglev guideway working rate $15–30 M/km per track (the highest-uncertainty line item in the programme, dependent on technology-transfer outcome). See Memo 19 §2.2, 3.2.

Tier 1 — Direct SBC revenueMaglev passenger fares: ~$3–6 B/yr at maturity (inside the combined freight+maglev locked total of $8–12 B/yr). 600 km/h sustained, Newcastle-Sydney 15 min, Sydney-Melbourne 90 min, Melbourne-Brisbane 3h 50min direct. Target fare $10–20/segment vs HSRA confirmed $31/segment. See Memo 20 §2.4.

Tier 2 — Enabled outcomes and cascading upliftMaglev connectivity cascade (Tier 3): labour mobility, regional services growth, tourism activation, housing pressure spread, domestic aviation contraction. Sydney-Newcastle 15 minutes makes the labour market a single market. See Memo 20 §4.3.

Without SBC — what Australia spends insteadWithout SBC, HSRA Stage 1 alone costs $93–120 B (locked Infrastructure Australia figure, BCR 0.2). Full east-coast HSRA network $350–510 B over 20-30 years. Delivers passenger rail at ~250 km/h on shared track. No freight integration. No HVDC, no water, no maglev speed. Memo 21 §4.1.

Programme-wide ROI summary → · Memo 19 (cost) · Memo 20 (returns) · Memo 21 (counterfactual)