ARTC ‘failing to listen’
Rail route will ‘destroy’ businesses
TIM Durre’s irrigated farm on the banks of Gowrie Creek in Charlton is an oasis of green amidst the drought-affected landscape.
Yet new maps show his successful farming venture will be dissected by the proposed Inland Rail line, destroying his business.
Landholders have had their first glimpse of how the $9.3 billion project will affect their properties, after the company in charge with the project began emailing maps showing “focused” areas of investigation, indicating where the line will run.
The emails prompted angry responses from farmers, who say the Australian Rail Track Corporation failed to consult with them, despite promises to do so.
Mr Durre said he was “absolutely bloody ropeable” after opening the recent email from ARTC.
He said ARTC representatives had visited his farm on December 16 last year, where they discussed his issues with the line and promised to get in touch before coming up with a route.
“We have not seen or heard from them,” he said.
“And I’ve put to them a couple of scenarios, that if they have to go through my farm, this would be ideal, and they haven’t listened to any of it.”
Mr Durre said the 120m-wide corridor identified by ARTC would prevent him accessing the bottom half of his farm - which was where he got his water from.
“It brings an irrigation farm back to a dryland farm. I’m disgusted with ARTC,” he said.
In another landholder’s map seen by The Chronicle, the “focused” investigation area - a 300m-wide corridor north of Dry Creek - cuts across four water mains supplying irrigation water to four individual owners’ paddocks, as well as passing close to four homes.
Kingsthorpe farmer Rob Rich wrote to ARTC this week saying the decision to focus on a study area north of Dry Creek was “perplexing, given that a few hundred meters to the south of Dry Creek a proposed rail line would not encounter any bore/wells or water mains”.
An ARTC spokesman said a key value underpinning the company’s community engagement approach was respectful and sensitive dealings with landowners.
“I understand that landowners’ homes and businesses are critically important to them and many have real queries about dust, noise and flooding which we want to talk to them about,” he said.
“It takes time to get this right and as we enter this more detailed phase of works we are taking care to engage with each individual landowner and to discuss what is important to them.
“We still have a long way to go in the process and we are trying to give people as much certainty as we can, as soon as we can.”