CJ Wellington Metropolitan Region

Proposed underground line (yellow) with existing metropolitan commuter routes (white)

Last night, the Government of New England has announced a 18-kilometre, $9.2 billion underground rail between Wellington and Stockport via Croydon.

According to Transport for Wellington (TfW), this proposal is significant because it means passengers from Croydon or Stockport no longer need to travel to Wellington Central station and change trains. It is a well known fact that Wellington actually has an extensive and sprawling metropolitan rail system which covers all satellite cities and major suburban centres. The system is also very well integrated with the metropolitan bus network and some light rail routes (in Stockport). However, the real problem is that all trains go straight to Wellington Central station without any possibilities to change trains before then.

For example, Croydon and Dagenham train stations both are under 3 kilometres apart, however passengers still need to travel 8 kilometres from Croydon to Wellington Central station. Once passengers are at Central station, they will need to change train and travel another 8 kilometres to Dagenham which adds up to 16 kilometres of travel. It is a similar issue for many other metropolitan train stations within the network. Again, the system is well designed for its purpose, however it restricts any opportunities for a very well integrated system without needing to use the Central station.

The 18-kilometre, $9.2 billion underground rail will solve this issue. The new route will also include 6 new stations (Embankment, King's Cross, Flemington, Glebe, Northcote, and Springburn) while other 7 underground stations will be located under existing overground stations (Wellington Central, Kensington, Croydon, Dagenham, Clapham Junction, Stockport High Street, and Stockport Queen Street). This is also a significant proposal because the route will connect 3 major satellite cities (Wellington, Croydon and Stockport). This essentially means passengers from Stockport will be able to catch train to Croydon in less than 10 minutes compared to up to 45 minutes presently.

This proposal is now up for community consultation where residents can provide a comment or opinion regarding design or alignment of the route. Transport for Wellington (TfW) fully supports this proposal, however they prefer to change the alignment between Flemington and Kensington. They believe it might be beneficial if the route goes through Newmarket instead, however the Government of New England disagrees with this idea.

The reason why the Government wants to build a new station at Glebe (instead of Newmarket) is that Glebe's existing planning constraints as "industrial zone" will soon be changed to "high density mixed-use" and "high density residential" which generally permits high-rise buildings up to 30 storeys high. They would like to change Glebe from an industrial suburb into a new Transit Oriented Development (TOD).

The Government of New England expects this proposal to be completed and operational by 2025.