Rail trail: senseless destruction echo.net.au - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from echo.net.au Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
A little rail tale echo.net.au - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from echo.net.au Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
On 14 January, 2015
The Echo comment ‘Railroaded’ quoted Don Page’s (Nationals then MP for Ballina) 2004 comments on the closure of the XPT train service on the Casino to Murwillumbah branch line after he’d done a massive backflip:
‘It (closure of the XPT service) is short sighted because the far north coast is a rapidly growing area and this infrastructure is central to our future. In future we will need more, not fewer, trains. We will need more commuter services and more tourist trains; we need to connect into the Queensland system. The removal of the service by the government will mean the line will fall into disrepair. That, in turn will mean all those opportunities will be lost to us’.
The Echo titled
A short history of our rail line debate is anything but. It’s full of personal assumptions, rumours, guestimates, and lacks any research or accuracy. (
Echo 13/1)
There’s no comparison with the slow, once a day XPT train service with a light commuter train service providing public transport for locals and six million tourists. They are very different, as are the costs and benefits, but the writer doesn’t bother with this vital fact.
The claim that the community was slow to react to the Casino to Murwillumbah (C-M) branch line’s closure, ‘probably because of the branch lines trifling impact’ is contrary to all the evidence and shows the writer has no idea what he’s talking about, or is being dishonest.