Action for Public Transport (N.S.W.) Inc.

This submission is from Action for Public Transport (NSW) Inc.

Action for Public Transport (NSW) is a transport advocacy group active in Sydney since 1974. We promote the interests of beneficiaries of public transport - both of passengers and the wider community. We make this submission on the draft Sydney Metro Station Design and Precinct Plan - Central Station revision E dated 11 November 2019.

Our main concern is the absence of any plan for expanding the Devonshire Street pedestrian tunnel. The tunnel connects Railway Square with Chalmers St and the southern concourse of Central station. Recent decades have seen a huge growth in the number of people using it, most of them twice daily. It's now better-lit and cleaner than it was in the 1950s but still no wider. It's about 7 metres wide and 270 metres long. Thousands of people, most of them rail passengers, trudge through it every weekday. Most of them do so twice each weekday and some of them have been doing it regularly for years.

Steady growth in rail passenger numbers in recent years has seen pedestrian traffic in the tunnel reach a level where the authorities are probably reluctant to direct significant numbers of new users into the tunnel. But no plans to expand the tunnel's capacity, whether by widening it or duplicating it, have surfaced.

When the design of the Sydney Metro station under Central was announced, we were surprised that the southern end of the Metro platform was not connected to the existing southern concourse even though it was only a few metres from it. And neither was connected directly to the Devonshire St pedestrian tunnel, only a few metres further away. They should be connected. Now that the Opal ticketing system is working, it should not be particularly difficult or costly to put Opal barriers in a new connection between the Devonshire St tunnel and the paid area. The best point would be near the foot of the steps down from the Redfern end of platforms 16 and 17, providing easy access from Metro and existing platforms alike.

As noted above, now is the time to expand the Devonshire St tunnel. This would probably be a new tunnel immediately south of the existing tunnel and it should have provision for steps up to any development over the flyovers.

The main benefit of this new work would be significantly less walking distance for thousands of rail passengers on many lines, especially the Bankstown line if it is diverted to use Metro platforms. Reducing the number of people in these tunnels and underground concourses also has obvious safety benefits.

Interestingly, figure 7 on page 30 of revision E shows circulation patterns from 2024 consistent with amplifying and connecting the Devonshire St tunnel as outlined above. Yet figure 25 on page 58 shows the connection cut between 16 and 17 and the intercity platforms.

Meanwhile, page 110 shows the City of Sydney's tabled concerns that "the project scope does not include the western extension of Central Walk, retaining connections between the suburban and country platforms and future proofing direct connections from Central Walk to the west side of Chalmers Street and from the Devonshire Street tunnel to the metro concourse." These concerns, which we agree with, are shown on page 110 as 'Noted' yet the rest of the SDPP seems to dismiss them.

We recommend that the SDPP be revised to include expansion of the Devonshire St pedestrian tunnel with connections to the paid area around the southern ends of both the Metro platforms and suburban platform 16.