Wollongong has not been included in a $20 million study into high-speed rail - but the city hasn't missed the train just yet, the Federal Government says.
Federal Infrastructure and Transport Minister Anthony Albanese on Sunday released the terms of reference for a $20 million government study into the economic benefits and financial viability of a high-speed rail network along the Australian east coast.
The study will first look at a Newcastle-Sydney link, dubbed the "spine" of any high-speed rail network, followed by lines north to Brisbane and south to Canberra and Melbourne.
Wollongong is absent from the list of possible destinations to be included in the initial stage of the study, but Cunningham MP Sharon Bird yesterday denied the city had been forgotten.
Mr Albanese has also promised Wollongong will be included in a subsequent feasibility study.
The city could be linked to high-speed rail via a "spur line", although experts have acknowledged the region's geography will pose a number of challenges.
Those same challenges have been credited with derailing a number of proposals to bring high-speed rail to Wollongong, dating back to 1997.
Ms Bird said the possibility of including the Illawarra in a high-speed rail network would be investigated in the study's second phase.
"In that process, part of that will be looking at potential spur lines," she said.
A spokesman for Mr Albanese's office said the minister remained committed to including Wollongong in the feasibility study.
"[The study is] going to be comprehensive, it's going to be thorough and it's going to look at all the options in terms of the possible connections to regional centres such as Wollongong," he said.
In an effort to put our region on the front foot, Ms Bird and Throsby MP Stephen Jones have asked Regional Development Australia (RDA) Illawarra to put together a working group whose job will be to tell the Government why Wollongong should get access to high-speed rail.
Ms Bird said the group would not be duplicating the federal study but would compile a "strategic positioning paper".
A similar strategy was adopted to attract the National Broadband Network to the region, which Ms Bird credited with the selection of Minnamurra and Kiama Downs as two of the first sites in the nation to receive access to the NBN.
"It's a paper that says, 'Look, these are the capacities in the region that would be enhanced by this piece of infrastructure, this is why it would be important to the region'," she said.
Minister for Regional Australia Simon Crean, who will address the RDA's State of the Illawarra regional leaders summit tomorrow, said he had encouraged the establishment of the RDA working group.
RDA Illawarra chief executive Natalie Burroughs said the working group would take in the views of all levels of government, tourism and transport industries and the community.
The group will provide input to both the first and second stages of the federal study and is due to meet for the first time this month.
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