Couldn't agree more with the author on the need for properly planned infrastructure that serves society.

Examples here in Melbourne are the constant demands from the public and planners for rail links to Doncaster (north east of the city) and the airport. Oh no too expensive or not enough demand claim the pollies. But they can find the money for a freeway across the city that will attract monopoly rents (tolls) for a private company to help trucks in/out of a wrongly located docks area.

I look at our current pollies and their senior bureaucrats and I doubt it would be possible to implement successful infrastructure like Sydney Harbour Bridge, Snowy Mountains scheme, Ord River.

As for something as innovative as Dr Bradfield! I can see the dust already rising as the watermelons brains heat up at the thought that anyone would dare to suggest such a thing. Build a dam! Get real.

DKit

Lets see, the road pays for itself whereas we, and we it is as most wont use it, should pay for a toy rail line for a 1%. No way, pay for yourself and keep your hands our of our pckets.

Well McCackie if that's your attitude to public transport then you'd better stop ALL buses and trains immediately. They all run at a cash loss. Oh and all your roads will become toll roads. Can't have some lousy freerider using your road without paying for it.

DKit

Just the teensiest bit of special pleading here, methinks.

Many of these are good suggestions, of course. And in the spirit of fairness to all, may I suggest that the billions of dollars secreted away in the oldies' super funds be pointed in the direction of Mr Compton's proposals? On a personal basis, of course, i.e. the superannuant voluntarily invests their funds into vehicles specifically established to build such facilities?

Kinda like the way building societies were first set up; you put money into a pot, accommodation gets built, and you then live in what you have designed and asked for.

In that way, we will find out whether the folk referred to in the article actually want to do something about it, or are happy just to grumble that "someone ought to do something".

After all, these are the folk who have benefitted most from Australia's prosperity during the baby-boomer days. They have received all the tax breaks associated with investing in Super, and are by far and away in the best position to fund themselves, instead of extracting even more from the economy that they will be leaving to the next generation.

Fine aspirations Everald.

But…

How can we talk about infrastructure without talking about population growth??

It is just nonsensical.

If we want better transport infrastructure and the alleviation of our terrible congestion problems in the big cities, then we need to very carefully consider the rate of population growth and the future size of the population in these places, and for the whole country.

We fundamentally need to note that the demand for new infrastructure is huge and the pressure on existing infrastructure continues to increase, and that even the most enormous effort put into building more infrastructure and improving the existing stuff will at best simply maintain the same overall standard for ever-more people!

This seems to be the huge hole in your reasoning, Everald, and in that of your think tank; Per Capita: http://www.percapita.org.au/01_cms/details.asp?ID=64

We’ve have surely got to very carefully consider the demand for infrastructure and what we can do to slow or stabilise it, rather than thinking entirely on the supply side.

It has surely got to be all about balancing demand and supply, rather than about struggling to improve the supply in the face of an unaddressed ever-rapidly-increasing demand.

Have to agree with most of this Everald.
Today, cars, trucks and buses, rely almost exclusively, on foreign fuel. And then sometimes sit for hours on clogged roadways, burning it!
This grid lock costs billions in lost productivity, whereas, a very rapid rail system that move commuters, would not only get them to their work stations or appointments quicker, but consume only locally sourced fuel while they travel.
My preferred system is the world's fastest, whisper quiet magnetron, constructed in continuous loops, via a single one way only circuits, that eliminated the possibility of collisions; meaning, modules could be dispatched as they filled, rather than waiting for a whole train to fill.
I promise you, this would be the most popular and profitable public transport system in the world, as people will always pay a premium, for very rapid, extremely safe service.
We could connect that with a monorail service, that ran round their own never ending circuits, and despatched modules as soon as they were fill; meaning, demand would control the frequency of the service, which would always run at a profit.
The thing that kills urban rail, light rail and trams, is the number of empty seats, and the enormous amount of fuel that must be burned, just to run half/nearly empty trains etc. And the mono rail service could connect with well planned moving walkways, that only ran, with a profit earning payload, roughly equal to half the payload of a monorail module? (Two or three people?)
The only limits on our technological and social progress, are those we actively impose on ourselves; particularly, by those experts, who know absolutely all the myriad reasons, why something can't be done!
Rhrosty.

Yet another intruder who wishes to dictate to us what we supposedly want and how we should live.

- Get behind me, Satan!

One tiny problem, Rhosty.

>>My preferred system is the world's fastest, whisper quiet magnetron, constructed in continuous loops, via a single one way only circuits<<

We do not have the capital available to build your dream. If we tried to borrow the money, the only source possible is overseas - notice how the only way we are able to dig stuff out of the ground is with overseas investment. And wouldn't there be a kickin' and a screamin' if anyone were to suggest that!

Even if we had the cash, think of the weepin' and wailin' that would go on, if we had to knock down a single house, or disturb the habitat of one single white-quilled rock pigeon...

Dream on. The fact that we have to live in the real world is sometimes tough to swallow, but in the end it's the only world we have.

There is no viable form of public transport on earth which could accommodate my daughter dropping her kids off at 2 different schools, on her way to work, or my son in-law picking those same kids up on his way home.

Public transport is a myth, a day dream for any who don't want to go to the city center from the suburbs. In fact it is fair to say it only caters for public servants spending their days in some ivory tower block in the CBD. AS such it is a dead loss.

When I was still working, I could have got a bus, 3 kilometers from my home at 6.00 AM, which, after a change to a train, then another bus, would have left me 4.5 kilometers from my factory at 10.20 AM. To catch the last transport home, I would have had to leave at 2.38 PM.

Perhaps I was wrong. Public transport, apart from subsidizing already overpaid bureaucrats, is a joke.

Pericles, ever sit down and work out what we already spend on roads?
The last time a political Leader, with a still functioning brain, dared dream large in this country, we built the snowy river scheme! And in spite of the incredible size, and huge comparative borrowing, we've even managed to pay the debt, completely!
When it finally was completely debt free, and paying a very handsome return, some politicians, (giant intellects) thought it would be a good idea, to sell it, and at fire sale prices!
We have over a trillion invested in our own super accounts, and due to the vagaries of international tax systems, we choose to invest most of it offshore!
We could build more than just a Magnetron here, if we made it more attractive for our funds to invest here. Very low tax or tax free treatment, and (a) govt guarantee(s) backing investment outlays, always providing they were invested in Australia, and the preferred projects earned a decent and growing return!
We would also need to relax some of our trade rules, and allow more skilled workers from places like China, to work here, say over the life of a project?
Which would likely hasten our free trade agreement with that economic giant!
Parenthetically, the Chinese are expert on the magnetron system, given they have several already up and running.
Meaning, they could build ours, and likely for a lot less, if we, who know B'all, tried to do it ourselves!
After we've finished our own magnetron systems, we could start on an inland shipping canal, that would allow our nuclear powered, roll on roll off shipping fleet, to export our commodities to asia, at the best turn around times in the world, given we would load each train just once, and only unload it, when our bulk goods had arrived at their ultimate destination(s)!
People just like you, I believe, are the real handbrake on our real progress, given you and your expert ilk, always know all the reasons something can't be done, or at least, not by us, poor penniless beggars!
Rhrosty.

Decentralization spend money on schools hospitals such not on more roads into cities
Look around the world every city has the same problem no matter how much money you throw at it traffic congestion , The fix get people to move out of these cities

Yes indeed, Rhosty, there is always a downside to being a realist.

>>People just like you, I believe, are the real handbrake on our real progress, given you and your expert ilk, always know all the reasons something can't be done, or at least, not by us, poor penniless beggars!<<

It is so much easier to be a dreamer, and pretend that "anything is possible", a mantra only ever employed by self-help gurus who have books'n'lecture tours to sell. The rest of us understand that a modicum of careful thought is required to make change happen.

Your facts are a little hazy, too.

>>And in spite of the incredible size, and huge comparative borrowing, we've even managed to pay the debt, completely!<<

There never was a separate funding source for the scheme. It was funded by the Commonwealth from local sources - i.e. taxes and bonds. At that time, we had the internal capacity to raise the necessary amount; today, we don't, our economy simply isn't big enough.

>>When it finally was completely debt free, and paying a very handsome return, some politicians, (giant intellects) thought it would be a good idea, to sell it, and at fire sale prices!<<

The entire scheme remains in the hands of the governments of NSW, Victoria and the Commonwealth.

http://www.snowyhydro.com.au/corporate/

>>We could build more than just a Magnetron here, if we made it more attractive for our funds to invest here. Very low tax or tax free treatment, and (a) govt guarantee(s) backing investment outlays<<

I assume you mean the trillion or so that is tied up in superannuation? Would you be happy, personally, to allocate your savings to such projects, given that they will not provide a return into your fund for decades... if ever? I think not.

>>We would also need to relax some of our trade rules, and allow more skilled workers from places like China, to work here, say over the life of a project?<<

That would most certainly be necessary. But might be politically dodgy territory, I suspect.

Yep, it sucks being a realist.

Aussieboy for once were on the same song sheet. Decentralization is the answer. Small cities, or large towns are much more efficient than huge great cities. We did a little in the 60s, then lost the will.

Much of Europe developed this way, with all staff, at all levels, living in walking distance, or at least in horse & buggy distance of their workplace.

One of the things I found excellent in Melbourne is the regional nature of much of it.

Places like Frankston & Geelong have areas catering to the low paid, & the company manager all within short distances of the industrial areas.

First we should move all public servants out of CBDs to the periphery of the cities.

Second convert Canberra to a huge old age center, & move all bureaucrats out to the electorates. Equity would demand the same number, of the same grades, be employed in each electorate.

Thirdly, lets move all ABC production facilities, & management functions to Longreach. With that one, there is no sense contaminating too many areas of the country with this rabble.