North Melbourne station work starts but expect delays to urban renewal
Construction of the new underground station in North Melbourne has begun, but it could be sitting in an industrial wasteland, with plans to transform the area into a thriving housing and business hub unlikely to be approved for another two years.
Public Transport Minister Jacinta Allan announced on Tuesday that works to build an underground station have started in the "Arden" precinct – a 56-hectare industrial site wedged between Kensington and North Melbourne.
Dozens of workers are now preparing to build walls that will go 30 metres underground, to ensure the safe excavation of 330,000 tonnes of rock and soil.
The new station near the corner of Arden and Laurens Streets will be called North Melbourne, while the current North Melbourne station will be renamed West Melbourne to better reflect its location.
The Arden precinct is now the subject of a 30-year government plan to gradually develop the area with homes for 25,000 people and 43,000 jobs.
The government owns significant land holdings in Arden, just south of the 88-hectare Macaulay urban renewal area, and hopes that the tunnel will help trigger $7 billion in urban development.
Public Transport Minister Jacinta Allan said that the new station would help transform the desolate precinct on the edge of the CBD.
"The project will be a catalyst to transform this part of Melbourne – the inner part of the city,” she said.
"Not only will we be constructing a new underground station with new train services coming into this part of North Melbourne, but the station will also be a catalyst for this area."
A draft plan for the precinct will likely be released late next year, with final plans expected to be approved by 2020.
It is not yet known exactly when the area will start to be developed, or whether people will be living in the precinct by the time the station is open in 2025.
A spokesman for Planning Minister Richard Wynne said the structure plan for Arden is set to be finished four years before the station opens, giving investors, developers and businesses enough time to start building before 2025.
‘‘We’re getting the plans in place now to make sure Arden becomes a hive of jobs and investment by the time our flagship new train station opens,’’ he said.
The North Melbourne construction site will also be used to launch two tunnel borers – 100-metre-long machines that will tunnel through the ground towards Kensington, before heading the opposite way, towards Parkville.
The machines will progressively install concrete linings to support the twin nine-kilometre tunnels.
The consortium overseeing the project will build an $18 million concrete manufacturing facility in Deer Park to produce concrete segments that will be installed underground to line the tunnel during excavation.
The manufacturing facility, set to be built this year, is specifically for the Melbourne Metro Tunnel because there are currently no suppliers in Victoria with either the capacity or experience to make these components on the scale required.
The facility is set to produce more than 50,000 concrete segments to line the tunnels, creating 80 new jobs, including for 50 ex-auto workers.
Station designs show that the entrance will be on Laurens Street, between Queensberry and Arden streets, with an option to create an additional entrance at the western end of the station as development grows.
The building will reference the area’s industrial history through the use of clay brick, bluestone, timber, steel and glass.
A cafe will be built in the station, with terraces for outdoor dining, public seating, garden beds and lawn areas.
There are plans for Laurens and Barwise Streets to be upgraded to become more pedestrian and public transport friendly.
Sheltered drop-off zones, taxi bays, pedestrian laneways, bike parking spaces and trees are planned for the area surrounding the station entrance.
The Metro Tunnel will join the Sunbury and Cranbourne and Pakenham lines that service Melbourne’s largest growth corridors in the north-west and south-east to create a new stand-alone line.