Senate Standing Committee on Rural and Regional Affairs and Transport
ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS ON NOTICE
Supplementary Budget Estimates October 2008
Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government

Senator LUDLAM - I am just trying to get a sense, I suppose, of the budget allocations in your agency that is for road funding as opposed to rail funding, regional or metro.

Senator LUDLAM-I am not looking for too many decimal places, but just a rough idea. You mainly do road infrastructure or is there a lot of expertise and funding towards rail? What is the rough split? Is your work across the agency 80 per cent road, 20 per cent rail, 90-10, 50-50? How does it break down in terms of the funds that you administer?

Senator LUDLAM-I would appreciate that just to get a rough breakdown. Do you fund cycleways as part of your transport budget?

Answer:

In the 2008-09 Budget, $2037.4 million was provided for work on the National Land Transport Network. On 12 December 2008, the Prime Minister announced the Nation Building package, which included accelerating project starts for the construction of 14 national road projects. This will increase the allocations by an additional $711 million over 2008-09 and 2009-10.

$1022.3 million was previously budgeted to be spent on the National Rail Network directly by the Government and by the wholly government owned Australian Rail Track Corporation (ARTC). The Nation Building package announcement also provided for a $1.2 billion injection into the ARTC to finance investment in 17 rail construction and upgrade projects that will significantly increase Australia's rail network.

Cycleways are funded as part of projects and are considered as eligible project costs under national network projects. State governments consider the need for public cycleways in the design and delivery phase.