Victoria has ordered four more tunnel boring machines for one of the state’s biggest ever rail tunnelling projects.

During a trip to China last week, Victorian Premier Jacinta Allen announced that four tunnel boring machines that will be used as part of the $34.5 billion Suburban Rail Loop project had been ordered.

The machines are currently under construction in Zhengzhou. They will soon be sent to Melbourne and will be launched from Burwood in Melbourne’s east next year.

Two will be launched in a southward direction toward Glen Waverley whilst two more will head north toward Box Hill.

Set to link Cheltenham in Melbourne’s south-east to Werribee in the south-west, the planned Suburban Rail Loop project is envisioned to be a 90km orbital loop project that will link up middle suburbs in Melbourne’s south-east, east, north, west and south-west.

It will be conducted in several stages.

The first stage- known as SRL East – will link Cheltenham in the southeast to Box Hill in the east.

This is scheduled to be delivered by 2035.

The project will be accompanied by six SRL East Neighborhoods or precincts which are to be delivered at Cheltenham, Clayton, Monash, Glen Waverley, Burwood and Box Hill.

These are envisioned to unlock up to 70,000 homes in addition to commercial and employment opportunities.

 

However, concerns remain about the project’s viability.

A 2021 business case prepared by the Victorian Government found that SRL East and the next subsequent extension of the SRL project (SRL North) would deliver a combined benefit to cost ratio of 1.7 to 1. (The Government has not issued a separate business case for SRL East.)

However, that business case along with the viability of the SRL East project has been called into question by Infrastructure Australia.

In a report released earlier this year, Infrastructure Australia raised concerns that:

  • the discount rate that was used in the business case to convert expected future benefits and costs into what were then today’s dollars was too low
  • the project may not be able to be delivered within current cost and timeframe estimates; and
  • there is insufficient detail to provide confidence that the current $11.5 billion which the government hopes to raise through value capture mechanisms to help fund the project will be realised.

That report advised the Victorian and Australian Governments to prepare an exit strategy for the project – something which now seems impossible in light of the ordering of the TBMs.

 

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