THE Australian Rail Track Corporation has appointed multi-national consortium Regionerate Rail to build the Inland Rail section between Gowrie (near Toowoomba) and Kagaru (near Beaudesert).
The section is about 128 kilometres long and it runs through some of the most challenging terrain in the 1700-kilometre rail line from Brisbane to Melbourne. The section includes a 6.2-kilometre tunnel through the Great Dividing Range.
ARTC Inland Rail interim chief executive Rebecca Pickering said the decision to select Regionerate Rail followed a two-year process.
“This landmark agreement is huge for Inland Rail and puts billions of dollars in stimulus, jobs and long-term economic growth on the table for Queensland – through construction, Inland Rail is expected to support more than 11,800 jobs and deliver a $7.8 billion boost to the state’s economy during construction and the over the forward operations,” Mrs Pickering said.
“This is an important step. Regionerate Rail have been able to leverage their own considerable engineering expertise to produce truly innovative design and construction methods for this technically challenging project,” she said.
“I am looking forward to seeing their solution become a reality. This project is a game-changer for the way we will deliver freight around the nation and during the past two years we have been reminded time and time again how important our future supply chains are.”
Regionerate Rail is a consortium comprising Clough, GS Engineering and Construction, Webuild (formerly Salini Impregilo), Service Stream and Plenary Group.
