How fight over valuable Sydney land will shape a future train line

Plans to extend a rail line for double-decker passenger trains into the heart of the new city of Bradfield in Sydney’s outer west have been opposed by sections of the NSW bureaucracy, who fear it will stifle almost $2 billion of investment over the next decade.

Confidential government documents show a $100 million final business case will recommend that a heavy rail line extension from Leppington end at a new station a few kilometres south of Bradfield, where it could connect – if built – to an extended metro line from Western Sydney Airport.

Emails and draft board papers show that as the business case was being finalised, the government agency responsible for Bradfield was becoming increasingly concerned last year about the prospect of a new heavy rail line taking up highly valuable land in the new city centre.

It spurred the Bradfield Development Authority to mount a lobbying campaign within government to convince Transport for NSW and ministerial staff to drop the plan for heavy rail to extend all the way in.

The Minns government will consider within the next few months the final business cases for a southern and northern extension of the Western Sydney Airport metro line, as well as the proposed extension of the heavy rail line westwards from Leppington.

Four new stations at Emerton, Bidwell, Marsden Park and Schofields have been identified for a northern metro extension between St Marys and Tallawong.

A southern metro extension from Bradfield could comprise seven new stations at Bradfield South, Maryland, Pondicherry, Oran Park, Narellan, Mount Annan, Macarthur and Campbelltown.

The internal documents reveal the tensions between the Bradfield Development Authority and senior transport officials over the plans to extend the heavy rail line by a viaduct from Leppington to a new station at Rossmore to Bradfield.

A draft board paper for the development authority in July last year shows it wanted the heavy rail corridor shifted eastwards to “liberate valuable land within the core CBD of Bradfield”. If built, the 60-metre-wide corridor earmarked for the extension “slices through” the central north-south zone of the Bradfield CBD.

The paper – marked “sensitive legal” – notes that a heavy rail team at Transport for NSW had “excluded to date consideration of Bradfield South as an interchange as this assumes a future Metro connection south, which is not yet formally ‘approved’ by government”.

An independent valuer had estimated land for the rail corridor was worth up to $100 million, and put the development potential at between $1.5 billion and $1.9 billion over the next decade.

The draft board paper states that the development authority “recommends multiple touchpoints across” the transport department to set up briefings of “key ministerial parties” to lobby for a heavy rail line to end further south of Bradfield. It added that the remaining months in 2025 were “critical” given the business cases were due early this year.

In an email in February this year, a senior planning official told colleagues that Sydney Metro had advised her that the so-called Bradfield South site had been listed in the final business case as the “preferred interchange” location between double-decker and driverless metro trains.

Despite this, an email a month later to Bradfield Development Authority chief executive Ken Morrison flagged concerns that Transport for NSW chief planner Simon Hunter was “messaging that the rail corridor position wasn’t moving”. The email added that there “may be a need for further advocacy”.

Coalition transport spokesperson Natalie Ward urged the government to confirm that it intends to follow the expert recommendation on the location of the new interchange at Bradfield South.

“You only build this infrastructure once. The final recommendation means it is the best option for commuters and taxpayers. This interchange would result in a seamless commuter experience and an excellent node to head north or east for south-west Sydney residents,” she said.

A NSW government spokesperson said the impact of potential rail and metro extensions around Bradfield had been investigated as part of the final business case, which it would formally consider.

Transport for NSW said planning for future connections was complex, and no final decision had been made on extensions to the metro or heavy rail networks beyond projects the government had already committed to. “Transport for NSW has undertaken a lengthy process to prepare various options for government consideration as part of the business case process,” it said.

A Bradfield Development Authority spokesperson said it was engaging closely with Transport for NSW on future transport planning to “achieve optimal outcomes for Bradfield City and the Aerotropolis” being built around the new airport.

“This work forms part of the final business case that will be formally considered by the NSW government,” they said.

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