Work has officially started on the long-awaited Suburban Rail Loop project in Melbourne.
Construction has begun at all six stations planned as part of the Suburban Rail Loop (East) project to allow tunnelling to being in 2026.
The announcement comes right after calls from the State Government for community and stakeholders to contribute to consultation on what sort of developments should occur and are needed in the neighbourhoods that surround each station.
Nearly 1000 people are working on the project with more than five million hours already clocked onsite.
Construction of the first tunnel-access structure will begin in Heatherton this week, with a tunnel boring launch site at Burwood and work starting on a temporary bridge at Box Hill to allow traffic to move while the tunnelling occurs underneath Whitehorse Road.
Early works have also started at Cheltenham while utilities and other services are being relocated at Glen Waverley, Clayton and Monash University before the underground stations are constructed.
The first tunnelling contract was awarded last year to build tunnels between Cheltenham and Glen Waverley and more detailed surveying work is still scheduled for 2024.
A contract for tunnelling between Glen Waverley and Box Hill is expected to be awarded later in 2024.
“By 2026, we’ll have four tunnel boring machines in the ground, twin tunnels being built, major contracts awarded and major construction under way at every one of the six station sites,” Victorian premier Jacinta Allan said.
Two different consortia are shortlisted for the contract to build the trains and signalling system and then operate the network.
The entire project will create 8000 jobs and six new underground stations between Cheltenham and Box Hill.
It received $11.8 billion in funding from the Victorian Government and $2.2 billion in federal funding and late last year the Federal Government’s review of infrastructure projects recommended that it get no further federal funding.
