A closer look at the Inland Freight System of Australia

When it comes to the inland freight system, the Australian road and rail are vast. Today, our route network looks like this:

The national key freight route map focusing on inland freight system

The map above shows a detailed picture of the road and rail routes connecting Australia’s important places. This includes ports, airports and intermodal terminals.

Freight created through domestic economic activity primarily moves through the land transport network and coastal shipping. Amazingly, these roads carry over 75% of non-bulk domestic freight.

With this much infrastructure, are Australia’s roads and rails enough to sustain the growing demand for freight movement? Some of you will answer “not”, especially for those who are in the industry for years.

Let us give you an insight on how the government address this growing concern.

Australia’s struggle due to an inefficient inland freight system

Estimated cost of congestion (2011 and 2031)

Since 2011, Australia has been experiencing congestion in the freight and logistics sector. This is causing major economic loss. What is even more alarming is that this is expected to double in 2031.

The 86% growth is most likely an underestimated forecast as it is not unusual for economic quantities to double every 10 to 20 years. As of this moment, Australia is already burdened by its effects. What will happen if it did, in fact, double and infrastructure development did not keep pace? That would be unimaginable.

Due to the rising demand of inland freight transportation, roads are now congested. The use of heavy truck such as B-doubles and B-triples is increasing to help combat this problem.

This calls for an immediate action. Otherwise, Australia will experience even heavier congestion in the near future.

The Australian Logistics Council’s calls for cooperation

Due to this nearing crisis, the Australian Logistics Council (ALC) encourages everyone, especially the Government, to get its supply chain right. Watch their 7-minute video below:

So what’s the plan?

Infrastructure has now become the key part of the Government’s plan. This is to improve the economic productive capacity of Australia. Thus, the creation of the “Infrastructure Investment” programme.

On an article entitled ‘Building our Future’, Senator Hon Fiona Nash announced:

“The Australian Government is building our future by delivering over $50 billion for the period 2013-14 to 2019-20 on wards, in critical road and rail infrastructure in an integrated investment plan that creates value and backs economic growth for Australians in our cities and regions.”

This includes a list of projects and programmes lined up for the funding and support of road and rail infrastructure development. Some are listed below:

Roads to Recovery program

As part of the Infrastructure Investment program, the government will provide $3.2B AUD to Australia’s local councils and governments. This in return will be used for the maintenance and repair of the local roads.

See the full details here. 

Black Spot program

This is part of the government’s commitment to reduce road crashes. It includes a $500M AUD fund with an additional $200M AUD over two years. This aims to improve the road safety across the nation.

Know more about this Black Spot programme .

Heavy Vehicle Safety and Productivity program

The objective of this program is to enhance the capacity of Australia’s existing roads. Moreover, this will help improve its freight network connections.

Bridges Renewal program

Through this program, the government will fund $300M AUD to upgrade and repair Australia’s bridges.

See more information about this program here.

National Highway Upgrade Programme

This program contains a set of proposed projects to improve Australia’s key national highway networks covering all states and territories. Namely:

• New South Wales
• Victoria
• Western Australia
• South Australia
• Tasmania
• ACT
• Northern Territory
• Queensland

The government has committed $228.7M AUD for these. Know more by going to this page.

Infrastructure priority list – funding the inland rail system

Due to the increasing pressure to address the problem of Australia’s congested roads, the idea of funding the inland rail system is seen as a feasible solution. It is expected to provide a direct, high-performance freight rail corridor between Melbourne and Brisbane. It is planned to extend to southeast Queensland to Adelaide and through to Perth.

Benefits of the inland rail system

Inland rail benefits

Although the construction process will take over ten years, the benefits of the Inland Rail System outweighs the wait. This includes:

• Having a backbone freight rail link between Melbourne and Brisbane
• Reducing rail transit time to less than 24 hours
• Decreasing the rail cost by $10 AUD per tonne
• Minimising congestion whilst creating capacity for Sydney road and rail
• Lessening the amount of carbon emission by 750,000 tonnes
• Reducing fuel as rail only requires one-third of road fuel
• Connecting cities, farms, mines, and ports more efficiently
• Reducing the burden on roads while improving safety

Read more about this project.

The future of the inland freight system in Australia

Let’s look at how Infrastructure Australia (IA) perceives the future through their Australian Infrastructure’s 15-year plan.

Two of the main points in the plan are connectivity and moving goods more efficiently.

The creation of the Infrastructure Investment program is a good plan to implement. For it provides a broad solution for the growing congestion with road improvements as well as valuable rail capacity between many of the major cities of Australia – Adelaide, Brisbane, Melbourne, Perth, and Sydney.

It will take years before we see the completion of the Port Botany Expansion, Melbourne Airport Upgrade Plan and the Inland Rail System. Nevertheless, these are good steps forward that will lead to a “Better Australia” for freight.