In just over a month’s time, Sydney’s monorail will make its final run, giving a handful of passengers one last loop around Australia’s largest city from its elevated line.
Once seen as the future of urban travel, the monorail has fallen out of fashion among Sydneysiders. Plans to integrate it with regional and light rail systems didn’t happen as planned and in March 2012 the New South Wales (NSW) Government bought the company that operates the system and announced plans to tear it down.
The Sydney Monorail is making way for an audacious mass development of the city’s Darling Harbour area – a popular tourist spot just south west of the Sydney Central Business District.
Designs for the renewed waterfront feature a new exhibition hall – the largest in the country – green public spaces, new shops and apartments, but no monorail. It’s a far cry from the mid 1980s when more than 20 companies fought for the chance to be a part of Sydney’s exciting monorail plans. Fast forward several decades and despite a nation-wide search, no interest was shown by anyone wanting to offer the monorail a new home.
Last week the NSW Government announced that it had awarded the contract to the company which will now lead demolition works.
Making the announcement, Minister for Transport Gladys Berejiklian said: “The monorail is not integrated with Sydney’s wider public transport network and has never been truly embraced by the community, and we can’t justify the costly upgrades required to keep it running.”
So how will Sydney’s commuters and tourists get around the city in the future? City officials see trams as the answer to Sydney’s public transport needs. An extension, which is expected to cost $1.6 billion and cover a 12 km stretch of the city, was announced last year and other extension projects are already underway.
On June 30, the monorail will make its final few stops before demolition works begin.
The NSW Government expects the 3.6 km track, seven stations and all the support structure to be gone within eight months. But it won’t be forgotten. After announcing plans to remove the monorail after 25 years, the NSW Government set up a website for passengers past and present to post their picture memories of riding the rail. All the images will eventually be archived to create a permenant formal record of the system’s life.
