The Sydney public transport system is a significant factor in determining property prices. On the one hand you have the ‘outliers’ – people who want to live in houses and who cannot afford the house prices of houses anywhere within 10 kilometers of the CBD. This creates demand in suburbs beyond the inner ring suburbs.  Many simply don’t want to be battling with the Sydney public transport system and may be eying inner suburbs for the future.

On the other hand you have people who want the convenience and the lifestyle associated with living in inner suburbs – Lower North Shore, Inner west, the City fringes and the Eastern Suburbs. Here supply and demand factors mean that apartments and semi-detached houses have risen strongly in value over the past five years.

The paradox is that the problem seems intractable.  No fewer than six different consulting firms have been engaged to look at ways of adding capacity to Sydney’s rail system. More recent advice by transport experts is that, over the next 25 years to allow more trains to run through the city – requirements that will cost in the region of $20 billion to $30 billion.

Newspapers have reported that senior bureaucrats have been told a multibillion-dollar overhaul of the system would be the cheapest and most efficient way to add capacity to CityRail during the next 25 years. One estimate shows costs of between $26 billion and $37 billion for adding capacity during the next 25 years. Without extra capacity through the CBD, trains will soon be so crowded in peak hours that services will need to be cut.

Two of the options raised involve using existing technology and double-deck carriages and building a second rail crossing over the harbor feeding a new station near Martin Place.

Another option, known as West Link, requires a second harbor crossing feeding a new station closer to Barangaroo. But three other options involve the ”three-tier” program of overhauling large parts of the CityRail grid, replacing it with ”metro-style” trains. These plans promise to run 28 trains an hour on existing lines through the city, compared to the maximum of 20 now.

A modified version of the three-tier strategy would cost $26.9 billion. The most expensive options would maintain double-deck trains across CityRail.

Whichever way one looks at these reports, it is clear that the same factors driving property prices today in Sydney as far as the split between those that want inner suburb convenience and lifestyle and these looking for affordable solutions, will still be driving prices in 5 years time.

Money spent on public transport won’t solve the problems but it will put money into the system.