One immediate result of the Morrison government's unexpected election victory is the second stage of the light rail, the already problematic Civic to Woden leg, just got at least $200 million harder.
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That is because the federal funding, pledged by Bill Shorten on March 13, conditional of course on his forming government and becoming prime minister, has evaporated along with the late autumn mist. We are yet to see what, if any, similar commitment the Coalition might make.
The money, to have come from a suite of policies designed to create jobs through infrastructure projects, had been welcomed by the ACT government, which saw it as a positive development at a time when the light rail project was already encountering serious headwinds.
It came soon after the decision to abandon the original Parkes and Barton Route in favour of running the tracks around the eastern side of State Circle, a decision Transport Minister Meegan Fitzharris described at the time as shorter but "not necessarily" cheaper.
That call had been made after a bipartisan federal parliamentary report found the proposed Barton route would "unavoidably add further complexity, time and cost to the project".
Andrew Barr, speaking earlier this week, made it clear the loss of the federal funding promised by Labor, which is extremely unlikely to be replicated by the returned Morrison government, was a grievous blow.
"I was expecting, or hoping, this week to be able to sit down with a Labor infrastructure minister and a Labor territories minister and focus on the parliamentary approval process and on delivering their $200 million commitment to the project," he said.
While Canberra's voters did their bit by delivering three federal seats, including the new seat of Bean, to Labor, Mr Shorten is no longer around to honour his side of the bargain. As a result Mr Barr claims the completion date may have to be pushed back.
A bipartisan federal parliamentary report found the proposed Barton route would "unavoidably add further complexity, time and cost to the project".
It now turns out Canberra's iconic Commonwealth Avenue bridge may need to be replaced with an entirely new structure to accommodate trams, road traffic and pedestrians as part of a project already being tipped to cost between $1.3 billion to $1.6 billion.
National Capital Authority chief executive Sally Barnes told a Property Council breakfast on Tuesday "it would be silly not to look at" the option of a new bridge given both the federal and territory governments were already planning for separate and significant upgrades to the existing 56-year-old structure.
While the structure had been well maintained, it has now reached an age where between $70 million and $100 million needs to be spent to keep it going for another 60 years.
While it would be foolish to spend this amount of money at the same time the Barr government is considering a third bridge to carry the light rail, the cost of an entirely new bridge capable of carrying all existing and future traffic is the great unknown. It certainly won't be cheap.
Given early hopes synergies could be gained from starting construction on stage two immediately after the completion of stage one were dashed long ago, what was always going to be a difficult, costly and complex project has just become much harder still.
Stage one was delivered in a timely and apparently cost effective manner, and, so far, is proving popular. Let's hope stage two follows a similar trajectory.