Track study steams ahead
AN EXTRAORDINARY meeting of Inland Rail community committees has been called to discuss the draft methodology that will be used to develop engineering works across the Condamine floodplain.
The meeting of the Inner Darling Downs and Southern Darling Downs Community Consultative Committees at the Brookstead Hall from 6pm on April 10 will be open to public observers.
SDCCC chair Graham Clapham said it was no secret that crossing the Condamine floodplain with Inland Rail was problematic.
“That’s not new information. And we’ve got a couple of options here - we can keep shouting about the problem or we can become part of the solution,” he said.
“Now... we don’t know what the solution is yet or even if there is one.
“Let’s have a look at it and see whether or not there can be an engineering solution to the problems that arise from building this infrastructure across the floodplain.”
Mr Clapham said consultants from the Future Freight Joint Venture - an Aecom and Aurecon consortium - would be present at the meeting to explain how they were going about designing the engineering works, what the issues were, and how those issues would be dealt with.
Mr Clapham said the extraordinary meeting had been the idea of both Future Freight Joint Venture and the community committees.
“(The consultants) want to understand from the people on the ground what they see as the issue and also they want to keep the community informed as to what it is they are doing,” Mr Clapham said.
“They are developing a plan for how they’re going to go about this study, and I guess out of all of the issues that arise with the construction of the inland rail infrastructure, the crossing of the Condamine floodplain is probably the most prominent and problematic issue.
“So it’s no surprise there’s an intense amount of community interest in it, so because of that the two community consultative committees feel its an important issue we need to understand thoroughly, right from the start of the process.”
For more information, head to inlandrail.artc.com.au.