Sydney to Melbourne High Speed Rail Investigation | Australian HSR

[@privateer9116]

HSR in Australia is a mythical but shy beast, typically only seen in the wild every three years (also known as 'Election Time'). Every time I'm sitting on the tarmac waiting to push back whilst the flights scheduled 15, 30, or 45 minutes after mine depart before we do, I curse the polticians who have failed us on rail infrastructure.

[@anthonypetniunas354]

It's my favourite election promise. So often brought up in a bid to win votes, only to be subject to a feasibility study (usually run by their mates businesses), only be be "shelved" 6 to 18 months later.

[@6yjjk]

I have absolutely no doubt that Qantas and friends stuff the right pockets as needed.

[@426dfv]

Don't curse these politicians as they are enjoying their free Qantas "Chairman" / Virgin Australia "Beyond" status sipping champagne, whilst savoring caviar in their ultra exclusive lounge. 🤣🤣🤣

[@RichardJohnson-nq9ys]

@@anthonypetniunas354and you forgot to mention that these studies usually cost many millions of dollars.

[@malcolmmoore6848]

@@426dfv When (and if) Fast Trains (300 - 350 km/h) come into place in Australia, the use of airports will be almost be deserted - and so will QANTAS ((massive powerful political pushback from here)) . Consider that Fast Trains can and will be used for rapid Freight transport - and that will clear the highways of dangerous B-Doubles - and dramatically reduce the amount of diesel and avgas imported into Australia - so the cost (of implementing "Quick Rail" (my terminology with 2540 mm (8' 4") rail gauge)) will be a massive BOP gain for Australia. West Sydney Airport will (quickly) become a White Mammoth!

[@DanielSchramm]

The Australian government has dedicated $500 million for planning, land purchases and early works for an eventual line from Melbourne to Brisbane. They should have just told Lucid Stew it was their birthday.

[@LucidStew]

Thank you! I wonder if Australia will finally go through with it this time.

[@Gnefitisis]

Lucid, you dog! I'm so happy to see you branch out and make some dough while at it. Haha! Keep it coming!

[@carisi2k11]

$500 million is just lip service.

[@Damien.Travels]

​@LucidStew so does everyone in Australia. 😅

[@daveg2104]

@@LucidStew I wouldn't hold my breath. It is possible that a smaller section could be built, but we are already committed to spend between $268bn and $368bn on AUKUS nuclear subs (and you just know the higher figure will blow out).

[@JohnFromAccounting]

30 years ago, we were told that "HSR would take so long, it would take 30 years to implement." Well, here we are. We could have started building it then and we would have it by now. We'll do another study saying that it was cost $X billion and take 30 years. So lets spend the money and get it built.

[@ianhomerpura8937]

@@JohnFromAccounting it's mainly propaganda by Qantas so they wouldn't have any competition lol

[@magical_catgirl]

If AusGov had just contracted JR to build the line in the 80s when they started talking about HSR, the line would have been running by now. A Brisbane-Sydney-Canberra-Melbourne HSR line would be roughly the same length as the Tokaido, San'yō, and Kyushu Shinkansen lines combined.

[@daleviker5884]

If the government had started building this 30 years ago then we would either be in terrible financial trouble today, or other services would have been cut to shreds. If you need to get to another capital city that badly, just go out to the airport.

[@ianhomerpura8937]

@@daleviker5884 oh look, another Qantas lobbyist. Do you really think a country can be bankrupted by ONE intercity high-speed rail line??

[@jordanb722]

Agreed. People don't seem to realise what a crazy price 68B is 6800$ for every man, woman and child in Sydney and Melbourne pit together - that's dozens and dozens of flights SYD-MEL. ​@@daleviker5884

[@rmar127]

Usually when you get a video about Australia from someone in the states, it’s very poorly researched and completely inaccurate. Happy to say this was actually pretty good. Though you butchered some of the pronunciations, you were surprisingly close on others. Would love to see a video of a Sydney to Brisbane HSR line. It’s the second busiest air route in Australia. Interestingly Brisbane to Melbourne is the third busiest route.

[@LucidStew]

Thank you! Sadly, still some inaccuracies, but I think I can learn from the feedback on this one. It helps that I've driven between Melbourne and Sydney, with the Melbourne-Canberra part on Hume. I'd like to come back to Australia eventually, both physically and in the video production sense. I will keep it in mind.

[@bazza2540]

@@LucidStew Pretty good. It wouldn't be double track though, 20-40 trains a day and 900km to space them out over.

[@webs34]

I like this new concept of going to other countries to see if HSR will work other there. Also happy birthday Ben enjoy your 30th birthday 🎂🥳

[@JohnFromAccounting]

The Melbourne-Sydney flight path is one of the most profitable on Earth. Converting many of those trips to HSR would not only increase accessibility between the two most significant cities in the country, but also make Canberra drastically more accessible, which it currently isn't. With the rapidly growing population in the country, HSR can complement the existing flight path and allow more travel across the country.

[@listohan]

Much business travel is day returns. HSR between the capitals is pure folly. The service is used to being turn up and go. Cost is one thing but the fares? will businesses pay them?

[@quasimal]

@@listohan Rail typically has much faster boarding and alighting than planes (business travel on private charter, by someone living or working close to a convenient airfield, not being typical), and is typically much closer to people than airports that are strategically positioned to *not* be near people. But put it this way: Who pays for the planes? Obviously the direct cost is born by passengers*. So who are the passengers? Well, it's a mix, but we know there are about 10 million of them per year; 10 million times already people have already decided the exorbitant ticket price was worth it to them. There is a large minority of Sydney and Melbourne residents who make the trip at least once a year. If you free up some cash from those people, they will likely be spending that when they actually reach Sydney and Melbourne on things other than just the travel, while making it more attractive in the first place to make the trip at all to anyone else. Who will benefit most from a link such as this are the businesses in Sydney and Melbourne that would benefit from more traffic from people more likely to spend their money. Of course the cost is huge and there is no way to do it without government backing - but materially it is much cheaper than what we have right now. That is, the mix of plane, bus, car, and some very slow train, travel between these two cities. * Well, ignoring the $2.7bn the govt floated to Qantas alone during lockdowns. And recent jet fuel initiatives. And the real cost to air quality of having ~50 A380s fly the route per day. And however much it costs taxpayers to subsidise the future excess cancer treatments of airport/airplane staff.

[@daleviker5884]

@@quasimal Why are you assuming that the train tickets would be cheaper than flying? You want taxpayers to lose billions more every year on top of the $100B capital cost? I've flown between the two cities literally hundreds of times, both business and privately. Most of the traffic between the two is business, and they will not touch the train - a plane let's them go to and from within a day, which the train simply can't do. Private travelers are more flexible when it comes to time, so they can currently get plane tickets cheaply as a result. Everyone would catch the train once as a novelty, but after that the numbers would fall away, because there is simply not a big enough market for the train.

[@dduay]

⁠@@daleviker5884 I would take the train.

[@quasimal]

@@daleviker5884The core assumptions I make are (1) We can deal with the outlay cost and (2) That trains are materially cheaper than the alternatives; that in a real tangible sense, they require less "stuff" to run, especially so from a per-trip view. Hence that the amortised running cost should be lower (3) The social costs (in actual dollar terms) of running trains, is much lower than the alternatives. These are assumptions belied by a lot of actual facts, but at least they're falsifiable. If these are all true, I think it makes perfect sense for (gasp) tax to fund it; tax payers should benefit from paying less (in [amount of tax that goes towards HSR]+[their own HSR fares]) than they would have for the equivalent air travel they'd do. (I'm not saying it's impossible a hypothetical HSR would simply suck due to mismanagement. If what I believe is really true -- that a good HSR would benefit everyone in the medium/long term, for the majority of people supplanting the Syd-Melb air route -- then arguably it's mismanagement already that we didn't do it decades ago.) A few other things you said: (1) "Most traffic between the two is business". Two things: I don't think this is true - it's probably more like, 10-20%. This survey www.sydney.edu.au/news-opinion/news/2021/11/08/australians-planning-domestic-and-international-trips.html seems to confirm that. But why does it matter? Lets say the HSR of this video exists and the majority of passengers, as I posit, are going to prefer it to air travel. If you're "traveling for business" and able to get to and from the terminals in a quick and easy way, then the airport just got quieter and even more convenient for you. The fare will probably be larger as the domestic leisure travel competes with cheaper and more convenient train travel. Personally, my for-business travel on this route would be greatly enhanced by being able to conveniently use (or even charge!) a laptop, without disruption, for the entire route. (2) "a plane let's them go to and from within a day, which the train simply can't do." This video is exactly about a hypothetical but realistic train that would take 3h to go from Sydney to Melbourne. It is easily accomplished in a day - or even twice in a day (if you're feeling slightly masochistic, anyway). I have done the Sydney to/from Canberra leg many times by car, bus, train, and plane - for business and for leisure - which does take ~2-4h, and even twice in a single day, and so have probably hundreds of thousands of others. The last time I went Sydney to Melbourne it took almost 6 hours from end-to-end. Train, airport security/boarding, small delay to takeoff, small delay to landing, the Skybus getting stuck in traffic, a tram out of the CBD, and a bus. As above, the experience of the majority of people on this route is actually not the business experience of a tax deductible taxi to an easy check-in at a convenient terminal, and having another one waiting for you after landing. The situation in Sydney is OK (at least there is decent rail connection there, and Central is quite a wonder nowadays); but the airport itself is large, extremely busy, and all flights are necessarily prone to possibly long delays. Anyway, I wrote a lot here during my lunch break from my domestic-aviation-industry-related work. But HSR between Sydney and Melbourne isn't the hill I'd die on. More and better rail within Melbourne itself would probably be a smarter, cheaper, and more lucrative investment for Victoria. Canberra and Sydney could improve the existing rail corridor to much benefit, for also less.

[@TheLazyNecromancer]

It's kind of insane they're focusing on Syd-Newcastle as a first link for HSR, the geography makes that so much harder than going south from Sydney. I think the logic there is about the existing Sydney Newcastle rail corridor being busier than the Sydney Canberra one, but that's just a function of the quality of service (fully electrified, dozens of trains a day vs like 3 diesels).

[@carisi2k11]

There is no direction into or out of Sydney that is easier. All directions have significant geographical issues to deal with.

[@mathewferstl7042]

The corridor is going to near capacity soon, so something needs to happen. AHSR will also study a freeway expansion as an alternative to capacity expansion.

[@TheLazyNecromancer]

@@carisi2k11 Towards Newy is much harder than towards Canberra! The 2011 study proposed dealing with the Hawkesbury and its surrounding hills by building what would have been the longest rail tunnel in the world.

[@deetoher]

Remember that the real benefit of High Speed rail isn't just speed, it is the huge capacity improvement by having fast not frequently stopping services on a different line. That means you can run a lot more stopping services on existing lines. Not explaining this was a big part of why people didn't buy into England's HS2 project.

[@danieleyre8913]

@@TheLazyNecromancer I agree. It’s a no brainer for me that the first line should be Sydney to Canberra. How many people have to take business flights or the coach each day between the two cities? And it’s the first leg between Sydney and Melbourne.

[@bjturon]

Nice Surprise. Many Happy Returns to Ben in Melbourne from Ben in Saratoga NY. Canada has two great pairs to study, Edmonton-Calgary and the Detroit-Toronto-Ottawa-Montreal-Quebec corridor. $$$ for Rancho-Vegas. Thanks! :D

[@LucidStew]

Thank you! I still need to get through SEHSR before going international beyond this one-off birthday greeting/vacation slideshow.

[@BigBlueMan118]

THANKYOU! I asked you for this like 6 months ago and you said maybe one day, that wonderful sunday has arrived! Looking forward to this one.

[@sarcasmo57]

Can't wait till they build this in 2092.

[@austinli8891]

commence construction in 2092, construction complete 2230

[@thepretenda]

Hahahahaha

[@thepretenda]

2492

[@cogerle]

Phase 1 only ... Which goes 10km

[@TheRoswellCode]

2092............. $ billion over budget.

[@barrybbq1]

I'm ex NSW Public Transport, politics has been the killer of HSR in Aus. The current Nth Sth corridor is the best location for an HSR but various private and political interests have all but knocked that on the head. Any HSR would should start at Southern Cross as it is more practical with the first stop being Seymour as it's the junction station for Shepparton and the surrounding area, also Seymour would would be the station for passengers from Bendigo region to get on rather than traveling to Melbourne. That's two very large catchment areas that would be silly not to include, then Albruy. After that it gets a bit tricky but my suggestion would be to continue up with a new line to Canberra which would join to original line at Goulburn for a second last stop before heading to Sydney using the same corridor. The last stop would be Strathfield to which is a major exchange hub for the Nth Coast line, then continue into Central. Anyway I like your video thanks.

[@danieleyre8913]

@@barrybbq1 I agree with your post except for the part of routing HSR through Strathfield. Yes I am well aware that it is a major interchange for Sydney suburban trains. But surely once HSR comes off the central highlands, it would stop at Campbelltown/ McArthur and then just cruise into Central station via the corridor used for the T8 South Line, with its un-utilised space for two more tracks. I’d say that trains from the central highlands would cease terminating at MacArthur and would also use the same corridor to.take people straight into Sydney. A future line to Brisbane would go through Strathfield and probably use the northern Corridor to Epping & Windsor before going its own HSr route northward.

[@barrybbq1]

​@@danieleyre8913 I wouldn't bother stopping at Campbelltown as it's only around 35 Ks out of Sydney. Starting at Central then Strathfield Hornsby Gosford Hamilton Maitland Singelton Muswellbrook Maybe Scone Tamwoth Armidale Glen Innes then on to Casino or Lismore Byron Bay Gold Coast then Brisbane. A yoyo service would operate between the stops to pickup/drop off HSR passengers. With the things we have learned over the last few decades and with much better equipment, replacing bridges and taking out bends and tunneling will no longer be considered a triumph in engineering it's just part of the job. Up until 2013 RailCorp was recognized as one of the most efficient track constructors in the world.

[@danieleyre8913]

@@barrybbq1 To be honest; I would skip Gosford and have the HSR corridor further inland, but then have a spur to the mainline that could run shuttles to Gosford. I would probably also skip Casino and run the line further east,closer to Yamba etc, and then up to the outskirts of the Gold Coast before connecting to the mainline near Brisbane (and of course terminating at Roma St). In the future; commuter shuttles into Brisbane could run cross-state from Coffs Harbour, Grafton, etc, similar tot the “javelin” service in Kent. As for Campbelltown; trains from the central highlands already terminate there and it would be a hub for the HSR for most of South western Sydney (and a bit beyond) and it it would run slower between there and Sydney; it may as well make a quick stop there.

[@barrybbq1]

@@danieleyre8913 I would insist on Gosford because the population of the Central Coast and Lake Macquarie is over 500,000 and growing, the rest you can have :)) I wonder if this bloke took into account the additional infrastructure and services needed to service the HSR in his guesstimate?

[@danieleyre8913]

@@barrybbq1 yes but how does that aid your argument? Gosford services could still use the corridor via a connecting spur. Aw yeah. And there wouldn’t need to be excessively expensive works and infrastructure built around Brisbane water and the Hawkesbury river estuary. I wonder if this clown has ever looked at how high speed rail is used in France, Germany of Italy? Or the geography around Gosford…

[@TheRoadTripChannel]

Happy Birthday, Ben 🎉🎈!

[@CityConnectionsMedia]

I'm actually working on a video on the history of HSR proposals myself, and yours is pretty good imo. The only notes I'd have is that it's unlikely they'd do a Sydney-Canberra-Melbourne Service, the plans even back in the 80s with the Bi-Centennial HSR and the Very Fast Train were for most trains to go straight from Sydney-Melbourne, with most Canberra trains being Sydney-to Canberra, and only a handful of Melbourne-Canberra services. The latter because it's just not that common for people to do that journey. But Sydney-Canberra is the most popular countrylink service. Also one thing that would add onto the cost, apart from the gauge (you'd need to do almost entirely new track within Victoria since the standard gauge line atm is crap, and the standard gauge ends at Southern Cross) is electrification. Sydney and Melbourne both use the antiquated 1.5kv DC OHLE system, which just isn't suited to HSR operations. Most new proposals want to use 25kv AC like in Europe, or in parts of the US. But dual-mode units aren't too difficult nowadays. Also getting into Sydney, the electrified portions are quite busy, so potentially if you wanted to operate more services than what countrylink does atm (2x Melbourne XPTs and 3x Canberra Xplorers per day per direction), you'd need to add more tracks. Some track slots are opening up on the Illawarra between Central and Sydenham due to the metro, and that portion could be sextuplicated if need (they planned on doing in the 40s, but didn't finish it), and from Wolli creek to Revesby its also quad track, but from there it's only dual-track. But again, they have planned to quad track it at some point.

[@LucidStew]

As hinted at in the video, I didn't care to get too far into the weeds with the finer details of the existing systems in Melbourne and Sydney. In the spirit of government, I elected to throw money at the problem instead. :D

[@CityConnectionsMedia]

@@LucidStew Yh, that works. But getting into the weeds can be fun sometimes :)

[@JohnFromAccounting]

Melbourne-Canberra currently isn't popular, but who is to say that that a regular and convenient service wouldn't induce demand?

[@davidpearn5925]

Sydney bureaucrats run Australia from Canberra and Kirribilli. Australia's biggest city NOW , doesn't even have a Prime ministerial residence . Running Australia is a Sydney entitlement thing.

[@EAFSQ9]

that moment when Queensland and Western Australia operate on 25kv 50Hz

[@jumbolarge108]

So nice of you to make this video for a subscriber’s birthday. As someone who lives in a metric country, I really appreciated the kilometers per hour units in this video. Maybe for future US videos, whenever you say a speed in miles per hour you could have a quick annotation that says what it is in kilometers per hour? Just a suggestion, still love your videos.

[@LucidStew]

As Imperial viewers of said Australian video had to do their own conversions, so shall metric viewers of U.S. videos. :) Come on, it's really easy to multiply by 1.6! If its been a while since anyone has done quick math in their head, it'll help them dust off the cobwebs.

[@DanielSchramm]

​@@LucidStew You put a lot of effort into making the proposals easy to parse (great visuals, clear calculations, etc). I think there's a lot of appetite for you to do global content in future, so having a consistent "base" metric for both distance and cost would make it easy to compare proposals across both US and global content. Including the miles and USD metrics (as annotations) in your global content would achieve this, though it would be great to have the metric values in your US content as well.

[@LucidStew]

@@DanielSchramm Ok, I'm convinced, but I'm not going to pad videos by actually SAYING both. I intensely dislike when other videos do that. :)

[@DanielSchramm]

@@LucidStew yeah, can just say whichever makes sense for that location.

[@Banana_Split_Cream_Buns]

- Repair & straighten existing track - Weld joints - Add tilt trains - 12 hours turns into 6 hours for a fraction of the cost of HSR.

[@aleck7777777]

* angry qantas noises *

[@duploman0003]

Cool special! Nice to feature another country!

[@atholmullen]

Just a minor point, but Australia uses left hand running, the opposite of your animations. 🙃 The current Australian government plan is to do Sydney to Newcastle as the first step of Melbourne to Brisbane via Canberra & Sydney. Preliminary information suggests that the Sydney end will be somewhere around Parramatta rather than Central, and that the Newcastle end would be around Cameron Park (an industrial area served by slow, congested roads and nowhere near public transport), and that almost all of the route would be in tunnel.

[@johndwilson6111]

Subject to change at each election cycle.😅

[@katrinabryce]

Most of the world uses left-hand running for high speed rail, because they copied the French who copied the British.

[@atholmullen]

@@johndwilson6111 Subject to cancellation by the next government upon taking office, then a new plan in the lead up to another election later on. 🤡

[@JimCullen]

I'm not super familiar with either Sydney or Newcastle (being from Brisbane), but those sound like terrible plans. _Maybe_ you can justify Parramatta because it's closer to where more people live (even though serving tourists and businesspeople is probably more likely to be useful, and they'd want CBD access), but Cameron Park sounds like an absolute, unmitigated disaster of a plan.

[@Nalehw]

Paramatta is actually not too shabby of an idea - planners are setting it up as essentially a 2nd CBD. It's a destination in its own right (especially for business travellers) and it's fairly well connected already, and they're improving it further with the Paramatta Light Rail and the Paramatta-to-City rail under construction. There's even tentative plans to run a north-south rail connecting Norwest to Kogarah via Paramatta, which will be very expensive (because they'll insist on tunnelling most of it) and I'm sceptical it'll ever get built, but if it does, it'll stitch together all the city's lines into a convenient orbital route and make Paramatta extremely central. But unless there's some major development plans I'm not aware of, Cameron Park is just a laughable idea. If they can't afford a new right-of-way through central Newcastle, they can just use the existing one, surely? It'd be slow but it's only a short patch.

[@supermanifolds]

Love your videos, hope this will help towards a new computer!

[@LucidStew]

I wish they'd include currency conversion in these. I nearly had a heart attack when I saw 500. :D. Thank you so much! These funds are being reserved specifically for the new rig.

[@-Katastrophe]

I'm sure he'll be quite happy with the pronunciation of Melbourne.

[@LucidStew]

Oh, we learned how not to say it our first day in-country thanks to a hotel clerk in Sydney who could not let Mel-born stand.

[@TheHsan22]

And to mess with you a bit more, a person from Melbourne is a Melburnian, not a Melbournian.🎉 From Sydney, a Sydney-sider. The entry into Canberra would be contentious, rather than a wye and dual spur, they would try to save a buck by using single track direct from Sydney then North along Barton Hwy off to Melbourne at Yass.

[@wolfblaide]

FYI, standard gauge track exists down into Southern Cross (Spencer St.) station, but not Flinders St. Flinders St. is a heritage building with no easy method to add a standard gauge track and platforms, it's really not something you'd want to do.

[@danieleyre8913]

@@wolfblaide Spencer street is the intercity terminus and Flinders St is the urban system station.

[@wolfblaide]

@@danieleyre8913 yep, I live here. I commented based on the assumption you could somewhat easily solve the issue of std gauge to Flinders, which seems doubtful (and pointless) to me.

[@danieleyre8913]

@@wolfblaide Why would they even consider it?! The intercity trains terminate at Spencer st.

[@wolfblaide]

@@danieleyre8913 why ask me? Um... Did you watch the vid?

[@decepticons_destroy]

@@wolfblaidei was thinking the same. Why need to terminate at Flinders when Southern Cross is the main terminus

[@zoltrix7779]

Great work on the video very impressive. There has been so many studies on this topic in Australia, its almost a joke. Such a needed project to reduce the insane flight path between Melbourne and Sydney. Australia has anotehr problem however, the crowding of Melbourne and Sydney, We need somewhere else to live that is within easy access to those cities. There has been routes proposed that go from Melbourne-Shepparton-Albury -Wagga-CanbeerSpur, then off to Sydney. This route would leave the existing route for freight and provide much fast speeds with new virgin track. Shepparton Albury and Wagga make great places to put people and keep the track in easy terrain.

[@theparks6541]

Thank you for this video. It would take the Australian government 8 years to come up with something comparable, so well done

[@magical_catgirl]

Then they'll scrap all that planning and start again 2 years later.

[@chuckbeggles8858]

8 years by gee you give them far too much credit, try 20 to 30 and you might be onto something????

[@AlphaGeekgirl]

Clearly you and everybody else that has responded to your comment has never lived overseas. Compared to 15/ first world countries, you would be incredibly surprised just how quick infrastructure is planned and developed and completed compared to other major cities. I am really sick and tired of all the whingeing and whining that happens these days. You should be thankful.

[@Austtube]

This concept is the best I've seen. The Australian proposals are usually too expensive, they try to be too fast, too cleaver by half. If this can be made economically in a well used route, it would be worth the expense. As you compare it to the Sydney to Newcastle idea, this compares well. That's if it is fully costed with all the unexpected costs. It is wise to use what we have, using freeway corridors as well as the usual train routes, depending on what suits the route better. That's really quite sensible

[@AnimeReference]

The problem is how easy it would be to lower travel time and cost of air travel between Melbourne and Sydney. Imagine an hourly hop on and go plane service ruining this.

[@MisterFro9]

Almost gave me a heart attack at 3:55, thought you were going to do us dirty. Thanks for using the right measurements ❤️

[@LucidStew]

I never convert for U.S. projects, so I thought it was only fair.

[@mariodidier001]

46B USD looks very doable. Kind of surprised HSR is very competitive to airplanes at 1000km...

[@LucidStew]

That's about where flying really starts pulling ahead of a truly fast train(~150mph avg). Some of it is down to extra hassle at the airport. Some of it is down to many large airports being far from city centers.

[@jasonreed7522]

When the train nolonger can compete on pure travel time, its probably best to look into other forms of competition like cost and comfort. The US used to have an private train called the auto-train that had 2 main selling points. The had auto carrier wagons so you could bring _your_ car with you. And since the target audience were vactioners going to Florida it was a party train with lots of alcohol. It was originally very popular. The key takeaway is if you can make the trainride itself significantly more enjoyable than flying or driving then that becomes a selling point even if you aren't the fastest option. (I personally think Amtrak's long distance route to rural towns should have this car carrier option, at a premium of course, but it solves the last mile problem for towns that will never have transit in their current state.) Edit: missed a critical hyphen

[@ianhomerpura8937]

​@@jasonreed7522 this is how HSR became popular in Europe and Japan - having speeds as fast as planes while having more freedom and leg room than airplanes. Plus the trains bring you straight to and from downtown.

[@barryrobbins7694]

⁠@@jasonreed7522 It is nice to have “usable time”. There isn’t a lot of “usable time” on plane trips even well past 1,000 kilometers. After sitting down in a train, you can pull out a laptop and get work done, read a book, watch a movie, etc. Stop what you are doing 5 or 10 minutes before arrival.

[@jasonreed7522]

@@barryrobbins7694 thats pretty much my point, if you cannot be objectively faster than the plane, then you need to advertise something else that makes you an option worth taking. Realistically comfort and the available amenities like fast internet and good food will be key selling points, as well as price.

[@williamhuang8309]

Best to start it at Southern Cross The Flinders Street Viaducts are already very busy and Flinders Street isn't a great place to terminate trains. Metrotunnel will remove some trains from that area and free up some platforms but unless a new viaduct is built or the City Loop Reconfiguration happens, it's not great. The trackage around Flinders Street is a bit of a mess and you really don't want suburban trains mixing with high speed trains as some of the tracks on the quad track viaduct switch direction halfway through the day and have quite a few operational quirks, and that viaduct has load restrictions on it as it's rather old. The new concrete viaduct is getting increasingly busy and it would be rather difficult to fit more trains onto it. Both viaducts have slow speed limits on them. Southern Cross at least gives you more space to work with, tons of terminating platforms and more space to put tracks and has a standard gauge connection compared to Flinders Street which has broad gauge access only and mainly through running platforms.

[@malcolmmoore6848]

Unfortunately the rail easement north of Melbourne CBD (Spencer St station) is rather narrow and that may well be a major rail congestion issue - but - there is/was a second northern run (north of Spencer Street station that branches off at North Melbourne / Kensington (with a few tight curves and this line then straightens up in Brunswick and is virtually straight through to Roxborough Park (about 19 km) and from here the rail easement is broad enough that there can be double width so the HSR effectively does not interfere with the main Melbourne rail traffic! This would mean that the first small section from Spencer St to Brunswick (about 6.5 km) would be limited to about 80 km/h (about 5 minutes) and then open up at 350 km/h after that going north! Craigieburn is on the northern outskirts of the Melbourne urban area and that is about 20 km north of Brunswick, and at nominally 350 km/h all the way (separate 8’ 4” (2540mm) rail line as outlined before) this would take less than 4 minutes and we are out of the Melbourne urban area in under 10 minutes from Spencer St Station.

[@williamhuang8309]

@@malcolmmoore6848 If you're referring to the Upfield line, that line is very straight north of Royal Park, but in Brunswick, there are dozens of level crossings- one every few hundred metres. While the level crossing removal project removed a bunch of crossings in the Coburg area, the elevated viaduct takes up quite a bit of space in the right of way and it would be quite difficult to fit more tracks. You'd probably need to build a wide elevated viaduct/rebuild the existing skyrail viaducts and place the tracks much closer together, and even then there might not be enough room for stations. The Upfield line is also single tracked north of Gowrie, but there is a lot more space there. Having high speed tracks on the ground is probably a bad idea anyways so it would need to go elevated. Using the Upfield line would probably be better overall as it's less crowded than the Craigieburn line but it's still nowhere near as simple slapping down a few extra tracks and letting trains run at 350km/h.

[@marshallbarker8792]

Thank you. This was a very well prepared and really interesting video. I appreciate the time spent preparing it.

[@LucidStew]

You're welcome. Thanks for watching!

[@Lephrenic]

Good stuff. I recommend reading Fastrack Australia's report on how the Syd-Mel HSR can be built in stages via upgrades of the existing line.

[@ianhomerpura8937]

It's basically how the French and Koreans built their high speed railways - keep existing railway hubs and stations, while building newer and straighter HSR corridors outside major cities.

[@qjtvaddict]

No need build a separate line and have it act as a super express full time replacement for express trains and the long distance trains (land cruise)

[@beaudjangles]

Yeah, I'm hard against a fresh line. This iteration on what is already there is much more sane.

[@ianhomerpura8937]

@@beaudjangles not really, since high speed rail services definitely need straighter corridors than normal

[@supermanifolds]

Completely unrealistic, the train is not even upside down On a serious note, very cool to see you exploring rights of way outside the US! You're spoiling us with this release cadence

[@edvoon]

Don’t forget that you have a 90min overhead for plane trips for security and checkin, etc. And longer if you have any issues with the weather or plane. Not to mention air traffic issues that occasionally happen. Also there is currently a curfew on Kingsford Smith airport so that means limited overnight services.(Won’t be a problem with the new airport) All in all the overheads means that the actual total travel time doesn’t favour air travel by that much, and if you consider environmental impact, travelling by rail emits much less CO2 than air travel.

[@TheRandCrews]

i’m mean it’s already added because Sydney to Melbourne is 95 mins or 1 hour 35, so he already added the 90 mins for the plane time

[@neilworms2]

Usually security in Australia for domestic flights isn't that bad, no TSA.

[@amyself6678]

My lord, cutting down billion trees in Australian for train that is slower shows train people are idiots. And any long distance travel is hi CO2, train included, and a train with all the cement track causes most of its co2 up front. US skips trains and is 40% higher income than France or UK, why copy the losers? I like trains, till I do the math and see the land need, then I get naseuous we are considering it. Even if France the people sorta prefer the planes, so no way are trains overall as fast. If we didn't have airports maybe do trains, but we have the airports, what idiots think we need 2 systems for the same routes. We need 1.

[@flamingfrancis]

The car set indicated as heavy rail @1:59 is, in fact, one of the new Sydney Metro driverless trains. Gauge is not a problem at all given that Standard rail has been operating betweek Sydney and Melbourne both ways for over 60 years. Costings appear unrelistic given cost of recent extension of Sydney Metro was $21billion for 15 Km but that is all tunneled with Sydney Harbour included. A similar HSR was planned with corridors mapped and signalling in planning around 40 years ago.

[@flamingfrancis]

Forgot to say that today's political polling indicates a change of Federal Government is statistically likely in next year's election. If that happens you can forget about any improvements for infrastructure like this.

[@LucidStew]

Very interesting. Kind of a similar situation in the States. I find the whole evolution of the issue fascinating.

[@Respectable_Username]

@@flamingfrancisYes and no. Labor's projected to go into minority govt, which means the Greens suddenly have a lot more power to force Labor to actually look into it more seriously! Pair that with the NSW govt's increased interest in rail over the last decade and between NSW Labor and Federal Greens on the crossbench, we can probably bully the feds into at least getting a Sydney to Canberra route going 😜

[@johndwilson6111]

Back in the 90s discussion about the Very Fast Train from Melbourne to Brisbane via Sydney was a big brain teaser. With a combined population of 9 million along the entire route we all laughed because while feasible with projected population growth it was beyond the ability of any engineering organisations to get past the airlines, trucking industry and the government road building agencies which were still backed by the car lobby at the time. Thirty years later the corridor has double the population and no real rail improvements except for urban rail funding from road congestion removal money allocation. By 2040 when i turn 90 there will be 25 million in the Melbourne to Brisbane via Sydney corridor. If we start with Lucid's idea now i jus might be lucky to see. 1. Hourly express Sydney to Brisbane 2. Hourly express Sydney to Melbourne 3. 20 min frequency Sydney to Canberra then on to Melbourne 4. 20 min frequency Melbourne to Canberra then Sydney 5. 20 min frequency Sydney to Brisbane not so express but under 4.5 hours. Qantas and Virgin airlines will complain loudly as will our airports. BUT they deserve the competition of good service. 😊😅😅😊

[@qjtvaddict]

Let em focus on LONG DISTANCE SERVICE!!!!!

[@johndwilson6111]

@qjtvaddict I hope so too, but was playing to the context. A 15 minute Sydney to Brisbane non stop and a 10 minute Sydney to Melbourne non stop is likely as the air traffic will be Qantas A321 every 10 minutes and same for Virgin by then, anyway as it is in morning "crush hours" now.

[@billedifier8584]

Qantas & Transurban execs could do a joint venture and have the whole east coast rapid transit market buttoned up.

[@Aysthete]

Fantastic hearing your pronunciations. You fuck up Wagga and then almost nail Murrumbidgee. It's really counter intuitive for Australians how hard our accent can be.

[@LucidStew]

wag-uh? Even more difficult is trying to say things the Australian way as a non-Australian without doing one's best Crocodile Dundee impersonation.

[@Best4bond]

@@LucidStew More like wog-ah

[@Marais1963]

@LucidStew as an Australian I can say you did pretty well on the pronunciation avoiding 90% of the typical US mistakes. Well done!

[@LucidStew]

@@Marais1963 Thank you! I picked up a little while I was there and that was aided by Australians being such friendly and helpful people. We had a great time on our vacation.

[@flamingfrancis]

@@LucidStew If you pronounce it by its' real name of Wagga Wagga you will learn doubly quick... It is an indigenous naming.

[@oscarlupton]

A video about Australian rail from overseas! Melbourne resident here- excellent video, we just have to hope that some day our country figures out how to build something that isn’t a highway

[@notyoutube8128]

The problem with plane is the wait time and passing through security, with a train you just hop on and go

[@electro_sykes]

HSR is right but until it is built, at least improving and having a seperate dedicated sleeper service is the way to go. 11 hours is just right for having dinner in sydney, hopping on a train, going to sleep and waking up in victoria, having breakfast as you pull into melbourne nice and refreshed for the day. This would be popular for budget-concious famillies, as well as business travellers (who wouldnt have to wake up extremely early to take a flight to Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane or wherever). Plus it would also be good for regional travellers too, considering how downhill Rex has gone, it would really give some people a much cheaper though slightly slower alternative. Such as ervice could even bring some minimal competition to the airlines and we could also improve day train service to Canberra as well. A NSW regional rail revival

[@mikevale3620]

Similar to 'Southern Aurora' from 1962 to 1987, when Australia's population was half what it is now.

[@electro_sykes]

@@mikevale3620 kinda. A much much more modernised version

[@sdsd4139]

Happy birthday Ben!! 🎉🎂🥳

[@eggballo4490]

What about future extensions from Melbourne to Adelaide and Sydney to Brisbane?

[@frontrowviews]

I would love to see a video on what a TGV-AVE connection between Barcelona and Montpellier would look like

[@jasonreed7522]

I was very confused for a second because I'm used to Barcelona Spain and Montpellier Vermont, and those shouldn't be linked by HSR. After asking google maps where the original Montpellier was; i definitely agree that its an interesting corridor/link to investigate.

[@KaiHenningsen]

@@jasonreed7522 You don't want HSR across the Atlantic? They used to do this on ships, which was much slower. 😇 On the other hand, an HSR line from somewhere well-connected in the EU, across Asia, across the Bering Strait into Alaska, and then across the continent to link up with the NE corridor somewhere ... and then down until the southernmost tip of South America, that would be fun! Probably enough to make a whole series.

[@jonahsrailwaychannel8958]

Great video mate! Considering the suburban rail loop in Melbourne will almost cost more at estimated 200 billion for just the eastern and northern sides, I would actually be in favour of scrapping the SRL for this if I had the choice. Only problems on the Melbourne end: SG track would need to be laid from SCS to FSS in the CBD, additionally, the existing goods like from Albion to Jacana is SG while the main/through suburban to Broadmeadows is a steep BG track trough the bank in Glenroy. also, the route via Albion takes you through airport west which is the same route as the proposed Airport rail link. Great video mate! It really made me consider how viable a HSR actually is in Australia.

[@LucidStew]

I looked at several options into Melbourne and they're all kind of mediocre, aside from a long tunnel and underground station. Same with Sydney, really. If they're willing to spend $20 billion on Sydney-Newcastle, maybe billions in new tunnels for Sydney and Melbourne isn't so far fetched. I do think, though, that the $45 billion - $67 billion estimate is a little far-fetched if it doesn't tend toward the budget-side.

[@jasonreed7522]

Based on a quick google standard gauge is about 24cm narrower than broad gauge, so its theoretically possible to just lay the stand tracks instead the broad tracks. You can either share a rail and add 1 rail 24cm inside the outer rail, or not share a rail and add 2 rails 12cm in from the outer rails. Its not ideal, but it's theoretically possible as a budget option. Atleast compared to expanding the width of the corridor or ripping put the BG and putting SG back in its place. Another option is making a train that can change its gauge. I think a couple dual gauge trains exist in the world, but the extra complexity is probably better off avoided.

[@ChrisJohannsen]

$200 billion is to build AND operate the line. Be careful of Murdoch media bullshit infecting your brain.

[@soulsphere9242]

@@jasonreed7522 We already do this to Southern Cross station. It is called Dual Guage. The Dual Guage does not go through to Flinders Street because there is simply no need. The bigger issue is that by going to Flinders Street you run into several problems with interference with metro operations but also the fact the wires are 1500-volt DC rather than modern 25kv AC.

[@LucidStew]

@@soulsphere9242 Flinders Street makes for a better video. It's nicer to look at. The line there runs right along the river. It's nice.

[@Mike_221]

God this would be so much nicer than queuing up at the airport like a mug, dealing with traffic parking and cramped planes. Trains will always be more convenient. Being able to step off onto the platform and walk outside the station into the heart of the city is irreplaceable.

[@agreencow565]

I like how you achieve the travel times, by running the trains on the right hand side, instead of our usual left hand side, that will allow the HSR to easily overtake current services. 😀

[@GroovyCommuting]

When you factor in the time travelling to/spending at airports until your plane takes off (and no delays), I think a 3.5 hr HSR is a much better alternative!

[@aussiebloke51]

In 1994/5 I travelled between Sydney and Canberra on a tilt-train but the government at the time decided not to proceed with further development. To make travel time competitive both Sydney and Melbourne need dedicated high-speed tunnels to get out of the CBD and suburbs. The Eurostar leaves St Pancras and then pops underground until it is out of London. My last train trip was London-Brussels-Hamburg-Copenhagen-Stockholm-(Ferry)-Helsinki-St Petersburg-Moscow-Ekaterinburg-Ulan-Ude-Vladivostok. Sadly, all of the trains were better than anything in Australia. To get a true very-high speed train built in a timely manner would be to get the Chinese to build it for us!

[@PuNicAdbo]

Quick question as a German here. Why do we need this turn around maneuver in Canberra? A normal HS Train 🚆 has a drivers cabin on both ends. You just put a 10 Min Stop in Canberra. The driver gets out, walks 🚶‍♂️ to the other side and the journey can continue. It is nice what they do in Japan with the Shinkansen seating 💺. But you can just ride facing backwards 😅 or is it just us crazy europens who can stand this and everyone else gets motion sickness?

[@austinli8891]

most people dont get motiom sickness, some people do.

[@AuJohnM]

Nah. The sensible route for a high speed train would clip the top edge of the ACT, meaning a station for Canberra, then have some tunnels and bridges to head south-west.

[@Respectable_Username]

Sydneysiders will _not_ put up with forcibly travelling backwards! We're too proud of our flippy seats to make that never an issue locally 😜

[@rmdvto]

Melbourne-Sydney video before a Toronto-Montreal video 😮

[@zsaleeba]

Melbourne-Sydney has over nine million passengers per year vs. about 1.3 million between Toronto and Montreal.

[@kyledoll2869]

This was really interesting, would love to see the main Canada corridor (Toronto to Montreal and beyond on both ends)!

[@LucidStew]

It is first on my list of U.S. HSR Corridor connectors after the Corridors series is done. Probably early next year.

[@jasonreed7522]

​@@LucidStew i look forwards to it. Quebec - Windsor is probably the closest HSR corridor to me that has a chance of existing at true HSR standards in my life. (I'm at the northern edge of NY) Its also a no-brainer for Canada when about half of their population is along that perfectly straight corridor. (Well straight like the US northeast corridor is straight.) Last i heard the Canadian government was aiming for high frequency and not high speed on that corridor though.

[@cmmartti]

​@@jasonreed7522 Canada is currently in the RFP stage and is requiring all participants to submit both high speed and high frequency proposals. HSR in Canada will happen eventually, but it will probably take a very long time.

[@jasonreed7522]

@@cmmartti that's promising, atleast they are asking for HSR proposals in addition to HFR. And unfortunately government is almost always glacially slow.

[@streafe]

Very cool! Couple things/ideas Like even you mentioned it would likely originate at southern cross station but PRESTIGE!! This is also where the standard guage track originates in Melbourne so is the logical place to start, and as broad guage only runs as far as Seymour on this route it makes sense that standard guage is the way to go Because of this there are couple of things coming out of melbourne that would have to change: - Using the Craigieburn rails would be basically impossible. Even if the entire Melbourne rail network changed to standard guage, it still takes current regional trains 28 minutes to get past Craigieburn on 20 minute suburban train headways, which become far worse in peak hour. Dual guage is also not an option because of the significantly reduced speeds. - A likely standard guage route would likely take the current route out of the city used by the Albury V-Line services, which heads through the West Melbourne yards, into the Bunbury St tunnel bypassing Footscray and using the dedicated standard guage track around to Sunshine, where it splits right and towards Broadmeadows passing close to the airport. This adds about 10km to the route but does have dedicated tracks which only have to compete with Albury regional services and freight. This might also allow a stop at sunshine if a platform is built which could serve as a point to switch trains to the airport via a future airport rail link but this serves a similar role to the Broadmeadows so having both would be redundant. I would also consider rerouting away from the Hume and towards Shepparton and having an additional optional stop there. it is reasonably large for an australian regional city and only adds 20km to the journey while being very flat and easy to route. My route jumps between the M39 and the regional rail wherever it suits, and heading out of Shepparton via the old rail allignment towards Dookie, north of the Warby-Owens National Park before rejoining your allignment somewhere along your bend around Chiltern. This would also allow passengers along the Seymour/Shepparton V/Line to have and easy point to change as there as Albury regional trains don't stop at any of the stations south of Seymour. A stop at Shepparton would allow these passengers to regional rail up to Shepparton and then board the HSR rather than ferrying backwards to Broadmeadows or Southern Cross only to pass back by where they were a couple hours ago (this point is probably biased because I live along that line but nonetheless I think Shepparton is big enough to warrant a stop.) This is where my knowledge stops, I know nothing of the NSW system so I cannot comment on those plans but I'm sure someone else will

[@cliffleigh7450]

Your Flinders St to Broadmeadows time is optimistic because of the competing paths for suburban trains.

[@hayden7264]

I would love to see a sequel showing how you’d continue it from Sydney to Brisbane

[@AntonioOliveira-tx2or]

I really enjoyed watching a video that leaves the US a little and goes to other countries. Since I'm Brazilian, I'd love to see what you think of the reality here, because there are some very interesting route designs, especially since it's a very populous country with many large cities. I'd really like to see how someone from outside here would see a HSR between Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo, or a Northeast Corridor near the coast between Fortaleza and Salvador. These would be very interesting videos for next year.

[@darynvoss7883]

Nice video. Your option seems a good compromise between speed and cost by using existing R.O.W. and highways. Obv it would be great to have a new low-curvature 360km/h track but the whole way but that would probably run to 12 digits. I think Canberra definitely needs to be on a spur and the mainline needs to be designed purely to minimise travel time MEL-SYD. Is it worth it? Australia has committed to having zero net emissions by 2045 and this will mean converting as much travel as possible to electrified surface transport. The price tag has to be weighed against the cost of doing this by some other means.

[@LucidStew]

Thank you! Yes, I think the terrain is a major reason not to go too crazy with the geometry UNLESS tunnelling suddenly becomes much cheaper. The option along A41 through Wagga Wagga is a LITTLE cleaner in that respect, but the portions on the ends and also between Goulburn and Campbelltown are pretty tricky as well.

[@EJP286CRSKW]

Forget Broadmeadows, and you can certainly forget the direct line to it with all those level crossings. 1st stop at Tullamarine Airport via the existing freeway rail reservation, shamefully locked out by CIty Link. Solve several problems at a stroke. One enquiry into this in the 1980s decided the way to start was a tunnel under the Yarra going _south._ You can tell how serious that was. General idea was to go East and coastal, which made some sense with grade separation all the way to Caulfield even then, and now probably Dandenong, but no major rural centers on the way before Sale.

[@DanielSchramm]

It's better to have the suburban stop in a place that connects well with other local / regional rail services, as that will improve the HSR catchment the most. Connecting to the airport won't help the SYD-MEL HSR route, which this project is prioritising. (not saying there shouldn't be a rail link between MEL and the CBD, but it should be a separate route)

[@theparks6541]

Thanks

[@LucidStew]

Thank you! Super thanks go to funding Vegas trips to document Brightline West construction. That will start next year. Make sure to check them out to see what you've helped create. It might be a preview of things to come in Australia!

[@theparks6541]

@@LucidStew You're welcome! donated because your videos are so important, especially this one about my home Australia

[@LucidStew]

@@theparks6541 I'm planning to cover the rest of the eastern system in a couple of videos next year, probably about 3 months apart.

[@johnleonard2202]

I love this, and have been doing my own "studies" on this corridor for some time. I'm going to add my comments here purely for discussion, not to shoot down Lucid at all. In short I think this project is vital to our future here in the land down under. 1. Melbourne to Broadmeadows. - I'd be starting at Southern Cross since that's what makes sense. I loved the idea of starting at Flinders Street though, but trust me the interior doesn't match the beauty of the exterior. - Due to the Metro Trains Melbourne services running on the Craigieburn line, you wont be running at 150km/h. - You can count on a journey time of 25min SCS-BMS. - The easiest solution for the track gauge issue is to convert the MTM Craigieburn line to dual gauge. I would also install a SG junction at Jacarna, allowing trains to come and go from all 3 platforms at BMS. Depending on service frequency, I would consider extending the DG all the way to Seymour, and possibly beyond to Shepparton. 2. Broadmeadows to Seymour - I think there is too much effort switch between the railway and freeway ROW's - Aussie's don't really like construction work. - The easier solution is to increase the curve radii along the existing railway ROW, which would only take minor land acquisitions at worst to accomplish. - I think a stop in Seymour is warranted as it would connect a lot of communities in the local area to the HSR corridor. Also I would be having a medium speed train parallel the HSR stopping at all the little towns along the way as well. A stop at Seymour would allow for changing between these services, along with changing between heading north to Shepparton, or North-East to Wangaratta and Albury. 3. Seymour to Albury - I keep changing my mind on whether the HSR should go through Shepparton or Wangaratta. Which ever one misses out would get a MSR link instead, in my mind. As this video followed the North-East line, I'll make my comments based on that. - I agree the HSR would need to bypass Euroa, although doing so you would likely run into cultural heritage issues. Perhaps the best option here, although it would mean slowing down, is utilising the freeway ROW. - My paralleling MSR would be stopping at all the little towns through here, all that V/Line currently serves. - It is worth a stop in either Benalla or Wangaratta, but not both. Wangaratta is the bigger town so it would likely be the choice. Doing so would connect lots of little places not directly along the corridor. It also serves as a bus transfer for going to the Victorian Alps, something especially valuable during the snow season. - Again I would look at increasing curve radii around Chiltern, rather than an entirely new ROW. You would likely be slowing down to 80km/h to utilise the existing tracks around Wodonga, before stopping at Albury. In a practical sense you aren't losing much time by doing any of this. - Without doing the sums properly, I'd probably looking at closer to 2hrs Melbourne to Albury, but saving a lot of cost and headache in construction. 4. Albury to Canberra - Skipping Wagga Wagga is absolutely insane. - You can use the existing ROW for the entire run - it is (broad strokes) all rated to 160km/h currently, and could easily support more than that even before looking at increasing curve radii. - North of Wagga Wagga, you are looking at greenfields either way - following the existing stations or cutting directly to Canberra. I think going straight to Canberra is the best solution. - The only question is do you stop in Gundagai? I think not, but again you would be linking in more communities from the foothills. - Since I would be going direct to Canberra, places like Cootamundra, Harden, and Yass would all be linked up by a separate MSR line - something that is desperately needed regardless as an improvement to the 1880's railway used at the moment. 5. Canberra to Glenfield - Again, skipping Goulburn is insane. - I would also be stopping at Moss Vale. - Both these link in a lot of off-corridor communities via road transfer. - All other towns missed can be served by MSR. - Other than that, I like the bluefields solution you have shown here. - It's a very smart idea to stop at Glenfield instead of Campbelltown. If only the NSW state government would extend the Leppington line to the new airport, instead of insisting on weird Metro (driverless) ideas. 6. Glenfield to Sydney - I'd use the existing tracks along the East Hills line, as you have done. - Top speeds along here are 160km/h at the moment. I would have to look into if it's possible to increase these, but you'd likely be following another train anyway. - Initially the system can be up and running this way, but I would investigate having new tunnels bored from either Wolli Creek or Erskenville to Central/Sydney Terminal. Just not sure the cost/benefit would be there.

[@johndwilson6111]

Wagga Wagga is like Goulburn for the slower trains. They don't generate the patronage, yet, for inclusion. Add them in for the almost fast services feeding Canberra. 😊

[@johnleonard2202]

@johndwilson6111 Wagga station is always packed when I see the day trains go through, and usually has people for the night trains as well. With HSR it would be competing with air travel as well, and would likely be cheaper than REX and QantasLink. You are potentially onto something that not every train would need to stop, although stopping would only add 5 minutes at most to the journey time.

[@DanielSchramm]

While your proposal may be lower cost, it sounds like it would be significantly slower from SYD-MEL to the point that it would no longer be competitive. Flights take around 3 hours (door to door best case), so anything slower than 3 hours 30 minutes isn't going to be as successful. How many stops does your proposal include? Each stop can add up to 5 minutes to the overall journey time as the train has to decelerate/accelerate and wait for people to board.

[@Respectable_Username]

@@DanielSchrammWhile it might be time-length not as competitive, it would be significantly more _comfortable_ than flying! I'll take a 2-3h penalty to not deal with airport kerfuffle including security and delays and instead get to sit down and read/watch a movie/listen to a podcast/sleep

[@TomMarvan]

Brilliant analysis, thank you.

[@barryrobbins7694]

An Australian on another channel referenced ABC’s show “Utopia” for an insight into why Australia doesn’t already have a high-speed rail system.

[@Ironing-Bored]

Well what they need is a very fast train

[@barryrobbins7694]

@@Ironing-Bored I haven’t seen the show. Is that a reference?

[@Marais1963]

@@barryrobbins7694 kzbin.info/www/bejne/bpLZZJ6km9GVh9E

[@Ironing-Bored]

@@barryrobbins7694 S1E3, it’s great

[@barryrobbins7694]

@@Ironing-Bored Thanks for the recommendation. I’ve seen the movie “The Dish” that was also directed by Rob Sitch. The movie is a comic dramatization of Australia’s role in the first Apollo moon landing. It stars Sam Neill.

[@Anthony-mi8eb]

Beautiful. Exactly where the bush fires were a few years ago!!

[@LucidStew]

It's like in California where they started a bunch of forest fires so they could get the land for CAHSR cheap.

[@fusche399]

Very cool! Maybe someday you could check out a brazilian high speed corridor between São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro?

[@Nick-kz6dg]

Bi-mode trains are also being introduced on NSW long distance services. But it wouldn’t be usable in Melbourne (or any other state) as the standard gauge interstate lines are not electrified.

[@Nderak]

happy birthday Ben

[@malcolmmoore6848]

Considering your Melbourne - Sydney HSR mapping - there is already an almost straight rail line between Goulburn and Canberra (using “Standard” gauge rail). This rail line was built in the early CE 1920s when there were very little mechanical aides. Consequently, it has a few “tightish bends” that could be very inexpensively taken out to have radii of greater than say 2-4 km and make this line capable of 350 km/h all the way (if they broadened the rail gauge to my 2540 mm (8’ 4”) and/or had a dual rail structure with the ancient 1435 mm (4’ 8.5”) rail gauge in the middle for occasional “standard gauge” slow trains! Currently, this is a single rail line and it could be very inexpensively duplicated. The rail distance is about 97 km and at nominally 300 km/h / 350 km/h that is about 18 minutes instead of about 1 hour by road. In other words, this “Wide” rail technology could very inexpensively provide a 20 minute shuffle running three trains per hour in each direction, or a 10 minute shuffle running six trains (each way) per hour. Assuming 80 seats per train car and 8 cars per train - that is about 640 passengers per train or about 3200 passengers (for 5 trains) within an hour! Hope this assists!

[@shanehumphries2392]

when I see it, I will believe it. it's been talk about for over 40 years

[@wineric123]

More info on the Super Express would be nice, as well as the cost for it. 👏🏻

[@Senstraizaa]

Such a great video discussing a quite unique proposal, I truly support this if it went ahead. I did want to mention one point in regard to travel time in other aspects compared to only being on a plane vs a train. The airport at Melbourne only has semi-frequent bus connections to the city and alternative modes of transport built in the future (i.e rail infrastructure) could be better to speed up travel time to the city centre since it currently takes around half an hour from airport to CBD. Also, airports take a bit of time to arrive, get through security, get to gates and any other small things needing to be done whereas train travel is a bit easier. Simply arriving at an allocated HSR station, having your ticket checked and boarding your seat makes it much more convenient then arriving 2-3 hrs early to get on a flight. I do want to add that current Melbourne to Sydney trains do have some delays (not by a major bit but still some extra times to the journey) so while it's not guaranteed, it could easily still occur. With that in mind, I think that all services besides the Melbourne to Sydney (Non-Express) would either be quicker (or close the flight time) and much more convenient for commuters, especially for those who may not be comfortable flying or who live really far our from Kingsford Smith Airport (i.e Glenfield and further west). Just my take here but definitely open to hearing what other people think.

[@daleviker5884]

"Much more convenient than arriving 2-3 hours early to get on a flight". Oh please, nobody arrives three hours early for an international flight let alone a domestic one. If you need to exaggerate so much it just undermines any point you might make. For domestic flights I usually arrive 45 mins before check in, and for rail trips about 20 minutes. Most of the time at the airport is spent walking from the entrance to the departure gate, which you still have to do when taking the train. People still have to get on board a train early to find a space for luggage (if they are carrying any). People still like to visit a shop for newspapers/candy before catching a train. The part where trains have it over planes is in security, but that will not be the case for much longer. Already in Europe many HSR services require security screening the same as airports (especially in Madrid, Barcelona, Paris) and it will only take one major terrorist incident for it to become mandatory everywhere.

[@g_e_o_m9369]

How about Melbourne to Adelaide, bonus points if you do Syndey to Adelaide via Broken Hill.

[@davesarks2954]

As a Melburnian you wouldn't get to Broadmeadows in 12 minutes since you would be sharing tracks with the local trains. However, I would also add stops at Seymour, Wangaratta, Wagga Wagga, and Goulburn. HSR is more about connected regional centres than it is about connecting metropolitain areas, particularly in a place like Aus. Oh, Mittagong as well.

[@spacy2004]

I don't think you would actually need reversing seats or some kind of back up maneuver in Canberra. It's quite common (in Germany at least) to just reverse high speed trains at major train stations.

[@r.sulfuratus]

I don't see how backing out would be an issue. German trains do it all the time since we still have a lot of terminus stations, e.g. in Frankfurt, Munich, or Leipzig (we don't talk about Stuttgart) and some routes just require reversing, like Hanover to Stralsund via Hamburg. The driver just goes to the other end of the train. Might take a few minutes longer than a regular stop, but surely not as long as a three-point-turn and doesn't require an additional spur. An idea worth exploring might be a station in Gunning or Yass with through-running Melbourne-Sydney trains and a line down to Canberra served by higher-speed regional rail with a timetable tied to the HSR trains. Same concept could also be used for Bowral/Moss Vale to Wollongong.

[@sskues1]

to have 3-4hours Syd-Mel would be useful and less than 2 hours to Syd-Can both would provide a good option instead of flying.

[@BIoknight000]

I was wondering if you'd bring your insight to this very route, but I didn't know if you'd ever leave the US for another country. Great to see you did cover with your usual flair!

[@deanstyles2567]

Nice work! I've long thought that the most challenging and expensive part of the project would be the first 300km or so out of Sydney. As for the path out of Melbourne, the more likely route would be west to Sunshine (likely with a stop), then north-east along the SG corridor to just short of Broadmeadows, then north from there. More connections with other services available at Sunshine and you're not stuck behind local trains as much. I'd also stop at Seymour because it's a junction for other regional services.

[@privateer9116]

Sunshine will also solve the connection to Melbourne Airport, given that the MARL will be in place (if every) long before the Broadmeadows to Airport section of the SRL (never-never-land)).

[@EJP286CRSKW]

I would forget about Broadmeadows, not very salubrious although well-connected, and stop at Tullamarine, having got there via the existing Tulla freeway reservation, reserved for exactly that purpose but signed away to CityLink shamefully.

[@atempestrages5059]

Wongarter. Love this man. :)

[@i_like_trainsyt]

the timing of him saying he would just wing the pronunciations for this video only right after miss-pronouncing Craigieburn is just so ironic. (it's pronounced kray-gee-burn by the way)

[@LucidStew]

I was pretty sure I'd said it wrong and it was a good time to address that possibility. Some other places are probably acceptable based on my visit there, but even then its nearly impossible to say some of those words right without practicing a fake accent for a month. For instance Melbourne. We were informed before we even got there that we were saying it wrong(Mel-born). Mel-burn was suggested, but of course locals say it more like Melb-un.

[@i_like_trainsyt]

@@LucidStew I mean we got a good laugh out of it 😂

[@JimCullen]

Sorry, when you talk about time competitiveness, is that _only_ accounting for travel time? Or is it also adding in transport time (getting to the airport is usually harder than getting to the central train station) and security time (the 1 hour recommended at domestic airports to get through security, absent from trains where you can typically just walk on)?

[@LucidStew]

For metro to metro, 45 minutes is added to account for additional time at the airport. For city to city that is combined with transport time from airport to city center.

[@hikarikaguraenjoyer9918]

Happy birthday Ben

[@MartinSchurmann-ym1ly]

Great work, love your graphics & planning. I think it would be great because rail takes you into centre of city unlike airports. Only thing is money.

[@TheRoadTripChannel]

I love the music 🎶! Stellar Wind. Twice! I use this particular song in most of my KZbin videos! 😃👍

[@LucidStew]

Yeah, its a great backing track, and long, too.

[@malcolmmoore6848]

I really like your choice of Spencer Street (Melbourne CBD) as the Inter-Regional station and leave Flinders St as the Urban Central Station! The reason is that unlike Sydney where the CBD is offset to the (far) east of the Sydney Basin, the Melbourne CBD is central to the whole Melbourne urban sprawl - and these two rail stations (Flinders St and Spencer St) are nearby - a quick tram trip apart - or a 1600 m one stop rail trip! Unfortunately the rail easement north of Melbourne CBD (Spencer St station) is rather narrow and that may well be a major rail congestion issue - but - there is/was a second northern run (north of Spencer Street station that branches off at North Melbourne / Kensington (with a few tight curves and this line then straightens up in Brunswick and is virtually straight through to Roxborough Park (about 19 km) and from here the rail easement is broad enough that there can be double width so the HSR effectively does not interfere with the main Melbourne rail traffic! This would mean that the first small section from Spencer St to Brunswick (about 6.5 km) would be limited to about 80 km/h (about 5 minutes) and then open up at 350 km/h after that going north! Craigieburn is on the northern outskirts of the Melbourne urban area and that is about 20 km north of Brunswick, and at nominally 350 km/h all the way (separate 8’ 4” (2540mm) rail line as outlined before) this would take less than 4 minutes and we are out of the Melbourne urban area in under 10 minutes from Spencer St Station.

[@reubenab6005]

I would favour double decker trains probably built by Alstom & having the service operated by V/Line which is arguably the best regional rail operator in Australia. And make this use an integrated fare system (NSW & Vic using the same card, but not same fare prices).

[@CoreyIsAussie]

Great video! I love the pronunciations! Such a tease hearing how quick it would be from city to city with HSR

[@hazptmedia]

They need to build this… it will be so worth it.

[@beaudjangles]

How often are you traveling between these cities? It seems like on average people do it once a year. Such a waste of money.

[@hazptmedia]

@@beaudjangles people will do it more as it would be more accessible. There is also connections to cities in between like Albury & Canberra.

[@beaudjangles]

@@hazptmedia Why will people do it more? Are there really that many people avoiding it because there's no train? I understand there might be a couple hundred tourists a day who that is true for but that's still a ridiculous amount of money for that purpose.

[@wraithleader012]

I was comparing the train times to the equivalent journeys in the air, but likewise using the stations as the end points (well Southern Cross instead of Flinders St, but essentially the same). Roughly 90 minutes in the air, about 30-40 minutes for the shuttle bus between Melbourne Airport and Southern Cross via shuttle bus transfer and 10-15 minutes for the train between Central and the Domestic Terminal station at Sydney Airport, for a total of roughly 2-2.5 hours. Obviously that assumes good transfer timing and doesn’t take into account boarding and deplaning, checking and retrieving luggage and so on. We really should have fast trains…

[@twentysixbit]

You should do Salt Lake City to Las Vegas as a potential Brightline West extension

[@dwc1964]

Looking at the map app, I see current travel times: car = 5:44 via I-15 at 420 miles (nice); train = 8:39 following basically the same route, at least from the map view; plane = 1:20 direct (11-15/day). No idea how many people make that trip by each of the modes currently, but if it's enough to sustain 11-15 direct flights/day, that's more people than I would have thought would make that trip on the regular, seeing as how no two cities are as far apart culturally, per stereotype anyway, than those two. The train would have to go 4x as fast as cars do now in order to compete with planes on time, which seems like a stretch. It struck me that, if we're going to do that, we might as well continue it from SLC to Denver along the I-80 and I-25 corridors. Vegas to Denver currently: car: 11 hours via I-15 and I-70; train = 16:25 following basically the same route; plane = 1:50 direct (19-25/day). There's no way a train could compete with planes from Vegas to Denver, either via SLC or the current rail route (going via SLC on HSR would probably be faster), and I stopped before checking SLC to Denver separately, but I'm sure there's plenty of traffic between those cities. And then I thought, what the hell, why not go from Denver south to ABQ, and then loop back around to Vegas via Flagstaff, just for completeness? (Sorry Phoenix but there's no good line between ABQ and Phoenix, while Flagstaff is right along the way; a Flagstaff-Phoenix-Tucson route looks like a good way for those folks to get onto the big 2000-mile HSR loop.) I mean, if we're going to dream, might as well dream big ...

[@twentysixbit]

@@dwc1964 there are currently no trains from SLC to LV. Amtrak doesn't operate any routes that way

[@dwc1964]

@@twentysixbit I was just going by what the map app said

[@iwcrn]

I think it should also stop at Wangaratta ,as it’s the gateway to the wine region and ski fields , potentially bringing in millions in revenue for the region’s tourism industry which, covers a large area. It would create more jobs for the region and help the area thrive .

[@lours6993]

Certainly worth it to build. Should have been done 40 years ago. Then we never would have had to build the second airport in Sydney for many billions. Express travel time needs to be kept close to 3 hours and then it is VERY competitive with the airlines. However, they will fight this to the death. First action should be to make it illegal for Qantas to give complementary ‘Chairman’s Lounge’ membership to members of parliament. Get rid of that and we’ll start to have some honest discussion in Australia on HSR.

[@mattoverton5526]

Having done a few Syd to Melb round trips the non express is pretty time competitive door to door by the time you flap about with Airport overhead. The super express maybe slightly ahead.

[@wildone8397]

I live in Sydney and used to live in Newcastle, so I know what it's like travelling between the cities.. The route for a High-speed rail, between the two is, let's face it, realistically going to have to be tunnels. Which cost bilions upon billions. And that's just a small section of the route between Melbourne & Brisbane. That's why it hasn't happened. I'd like it to, but the government doesn't want to pay that. That's why High speed rail won't happen for:

[@edreeves6440]

It's not only tunnels. With my interest in Indonesia I watched many videos on the construction of the Jakarta-Bandung 350 km/h double track line, much of which is high up on concrete supports, each of which is supported by piles bored into the earth. And there are tunnels ranging from 1km to 5km in length. The thing is that high-speed rail has to maintain gradients not exceeding 1 degree which severely restricts where and how you build. Then you have to use special steels which have been de-gassed in vacuum to remove hydrogen gas, (which leads to brittleness and loss of strength). Then you have to have mm accuracy rail alignment. Then you have to polish the rails to reduce friction and vibrations. Then the tracks can't be laid in cold weather, they need to be near the maximum thermal expansion point to avoid buckling in hot weather, because the rails are continuous. Can you just hear the cash-registers tingling? The J-B track was built by the Chinese who have more experience at building them than the rest of the world combined. Of course Australia will not use the Chinese, and as they are the only ones who could build it near budget, it will never be done.

[@gaminghame8245]

Australia episode lessgooo!!!

[@wintermath3173]

Worth it? I say do it. We need a non-co2 way of getting between all these cities. Do you Australians want to keep your reef or what?

[@nicholashurrell3257]

16:30 I think the more apt comparison is actually looking at the other transportation options between Melbourne and Sydney. Around 10 hours nonstop by car, 12 by bus or current train, and Canberra is well out of the way for all 3.

[@nicholashurrell3257]

I’d also say that Melbourne-Adelaide would be significantly easier to make an HSR line, given the pre-existing Overland Train route is already relatively straight and flat

[@dctraining407]

Stew Booboo: using mph at 6:36 :)

[@jeffreypierson2064]

I have it at 6:28, after I read your post.

[@mattjohnson1727]

Could you do the analysis of Sydney to Newcastle using portions of higher speed rail and high speed track removing curves and particular high speed track between Gosford and Newcastle and Cowan to Strathfield?

[@LucidStew]

I believe I will be coming back to Australia at some point and Sydney-Newcastle would be the first intended video.

[@mattjohnson1727]

@@LucidStew brilliant, I’ve looked at it in detail my BFs father is charged with HSR, so I’m keen to outline alternatives that are similar to improvements done over a holistic progressive upgrade of the track (we don’t have the skills or manpower to roll out a full length piece of track as high speed all at once - we risk going down HS2 or CAHSR track and blowing out budgets where we could follow Spain or germanys approach and keep upgrading lines)

[@AuJohnM]

Simply not enough potential passengers to justify the huge cost. Sure it might get the passenger numbers in peak hours, but outside those times tumbleweed will roll through the carriages.

[@montageproductions]

The whole area between Mittagong and Campbelltown is unsuitable for a HSR track due to the extensive mining and subsequent sinking of the terrain. The existing railway itself has subsidence monitors beside the track. Pheasant's Nest Freeway bridge has had to be reinforced, Redbank tunnel was closed due to instability as Xtrata Mining paid for the bypass. Many houses in the area suffer cracking. HSR needs stability as the engineering tolerances are more critical.

[@flamingfrancis]

Also the case with Newcastle region which has really been rocking in recent times. You can virtually say that for the Sydney (Coal) Basin south to beyond Wollongong and west to Burragorang Valley / Lithgow.

[@daleviker5884]

Australia has not been "talking about HSR for decades". No one with common sense takes it seriously. There is a certain entitled segment of the population that wants it, and whenever elections are imminent, cynical politicians pretend to be studying the matter just to get votes from that group. It is hard to imagine a place where HSR is LESS viable than Sydney to Melbourne. They are both big spread out cities, but they are a long way away from each other, and there is nothing in between other than millions of sheep and cattle. The comparative travel times shown in this video are not realistic. The time for flying Sydney to Melbourne is 95 mins, and the channel has allowed 45 mins at either end for a total travel time of about 3 hours. But for the train, the comparison only takes into account the train trip itself. No allowance is made for getting to and from the train stations, which in Sydney and Melbourne would be little different from getting to and from the airport. Door to door a HSR between the two cities would be at least a 6 hour total duration for most, and that's simply not competitive with 3 hours flying. Especially since the majority of the Sydney to Melbourne air-traffic is business related, with customers being very time sensitive.

[@LucidStew]

Would you like several dozens references showing that Australia has been talking about HSR for decades? What are your sources that it hasn't? The way the time comparisons work is that the airports are assumed to impose a 45 minute penalty over train stations due to things like security, inefficient boarding process, and taxiing. This is probably generous to flying. The metro to metro times do not account for transit from the station because in both cases, you're in the metro and your destination could be anywhere else in the metro. The city to city times account for time to get from city to city, as it describes. The train benefits here because in these cases it leaves from the city and arrives at the city. The airports, on the other hand are outside the city, and transit is required to get to and from the city. In this case it was 30 minutes Melbourne, 20 minutes Sydney, and 10 minutes Canberra. In the case of city to city there is no need to account for door to door because I'm not calculating door to door, nor could door to door be reasonably calculated because there are a million doors on each end. What you're attempting to argue at the end with the 6 hour number is actually already shown in the metro to metro comparison. As I vocalized in the video, an HSR train doesn't fare well in that case except for Sydney-Canberra.

[@daleviker5884]

@@LucidStew Whatever references you can show me of HSR discussions from Sydney to Melbourne will be in the nature of publicity stunts, though obviously they will not identify themselves as such. You should check out Utopia, an Australian satire on government and business, which shone a light on the cynicism of government "studies" on his topic. (Search "Utopia - Can High Speed Rail work in Australia".) And as to the time comparisons, I'm not persuaded by your logic. Eg you penalize the planes because "airports are located out of the city". In Sydney, the airport is within the city, and a material chunk of Sydneysiders live closer to the airport than to the central train station. Likewise in Melbourne although the airport is more distant from the CBD, Melbourne is a geographically a large sprawling city, and once again a material chunk live closer to the airport than to Flinders St Station. I have caught both planes and high speed trains aplenty, and in my experience, all train enthusiast sites overstate the time and difficulty of flying, and understate the overall elapsed time of train travel.

[@LucidStew]

@@daleviker5884 The airport is not in the City of Sydney. The entire metric is core to core. You're arguing something completely different, which again is covered by the metro to metro comparisons. It was conceded in the video that HSR would not compete well on time outside of Sydney-Canberra in that case. I've flown plenty and have ridden trains a fair amount as well. 45 minutes is absolutely fair. There is definitely extra hassle involved with a plane and it is significant. I'm also not a train enthusiast, nor do I have any problem with planes. I like flying.

[@ignas6996]

Correct, Sydney to Melbourne is not viable, it's the Newcastle Sydney Wollongong corridor that has tens of millions more potential trips. For Syd-Melb people will continue to fly, it's quicker.

[@Hkchinese888]

We've been talking about this topic many times, I think it doesn't work, just enjoy the West Sydney airport in 2026.

[@PaulTaylor2424]

Thanks, one day we may get high-speed rail,😂.I have travelled for work many times from Melb to Syd door to door, which is about 3.5hr by Taxi/Air if no issues. I would like the HSR to go via Melbourne Airport and then to Sydney new Airport, especially for those foggy that days planes are grounded. I think Sydeny is also putting in HSR to the new airport.

[@bgabriel28]

Nice video. Citynerd did a video recently that made the case for Maglev on the NE corridor of the US. I wonder if the same could be said for Sydney-Melbourne. It would certainly be more competitive with flying, and it would be interesting to see how the price difference would compare in terms of ticket cost. Given that HSR for california doesn't seem likely to be completed before I'm a great grandfather, It might have been better for them to go straight to Maglev as well.

[@mark123655]

Nice video and great graphics. Think the cost is likely quite a bit higher.. and its probably improved by using dedicated tunnels in Sydney and Melbourne rather than existing RoW which is already crowded.and much lower speeds. See stations at Albury and WaggaWagga as needed - along with a pish to increase their populations, and maybe Goulburn as well. Would be interested to see the cost of say Wagga Wagga to Tumut and then tunnel under the Brindebellas to Canberra. Nature of TBMs means one long tunnel may well be cheaper than multiple short ones. Rather than Glenfield id have a southern sydney station at Campbeltown or Macarthur - larger centres and also have proposals for extension of the rail line from the WSI airport

[@deluxxxedriver4420]

i think that the deviation to wagga is important as it's the hub in the riverina

[@mathswithpete5078]

Lucid can you please do an estimate of a "Budget" melbourne to adelaide high speed rail? The idea here is to have a Brightline style service following the existing standard gauge route but with upgraded crossings signalling and rail. Service would be 200 kph diesel like Brightline, 225 kph if that is possible. The one fly in the ointment is the need for a new alignment around the Adelaide Hills. Given that the route is only 700 or so kilometres a 4 hour express service should be possible without electrification.