CJ Grosvenor, New Albana

BREAKING: Grosvenor City Council is now pushing ahead the $3.5 billion underground rail proposal that could potentially solve the exacerbating congestion at Grosvenor Queen Street railway station.

The new underground rail loop around the Central Business District was seen as a long-term solution for serious congestion at Queen Street station primarily due to its design as the 'dead-end' railway terminus. Even though the station currently has ten platforms (capacity of 1,700 trains a day), the serious congestion was caused by a disruption in flow because all trains were required to reverse direction. This causes significant delays for incoming trains, especially in the peak hour.

The Cross City Metro was built in 1997 to alleviate this problem and to provide a new rail link between two largest and busiest train stations, Queen and William street stations. This did provide some sort of relief to congestion at Queen Street station however it failed to address long-term problems associated with the design of the station itself. In 2012, a comprehensive report was sent to Grosvenor City Council with recommendations including a new underground rail orbital around the CBD. The City Orbital plan was formally proposed by Grosvenor City Council in 2015, slated for 2022 completion.



The City Orbital proposal (orange line) will allow western and southern commuter lines continue their service through Queen Street station without reversing. As part of this proposal, three new underground train stations will be built at West End, St. James and Museum while new underground platforms will be built at existing William Street and South Terrace stations. This proposal is specially designed to improve integration and flow of the metropolitan train network by linking with existing Cross City Metro stations (blue line). This proposal is expected to significantly increase capacity at Queen Street station, from 1,700 trains to at least 2,400 trains a day. All northern train lines will continue to terminate at Queen Street, and reverse direction.

Aerial view of Grosvenor Queen Street railway station with bus and tram terminuses.​

Additionally, as part of this $3.5 billion proposal, Queen Street station will also undergo a major refurbishment that includes partial demolition, upgrades, modernisation and new extensions. The existing train platforms will be demolished and rebuilt to make it wider and significantly longer to accommodate higher-capacity 'Next Generation Trains' (NGT) which is expected to be delivered in 2019. Wider and longer platforms will allow Queen Street station to absorb more passengers and significantly increase the capacity.

Due to a major refurbishment of the station, the current numbering system for train platforms will change as existing bus and tram platform numbers will be incorporated into Queen Street station. As a result of the change, Queen Street will soon have 20 platforms instead of 10. Please refer to more information below:

TRAM TERMINUS
The current platform configuration at Queen Street tram terminus (located in the front of the train station) will change from Inbound 1, Inbound 2, Outbound 1 and Outbound 2 (I1, I2, O1 and O2 platforms) to Platform 1, 2, 3 and 4. Platform 1 and 2 will be used specifically for trams that terminates at Queen Street station whereas Platform 3 and 4 will be used for thoroughfare tram services.

RAILWAY TERMINUS
The current platform configuration at Queen Street railway station will change from Platform 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10 to Platform 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13 and 14. This will allow better integration between tram and train services. Platform 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10 will be converted into thoroughfare platforms as part of the City Orbital proposal. Platform 11, 12, 13 and 14 will remain 'dead-end' where trains will reverse direction.

CROSS CITY METRO
Queen Street station currently has two underground railway platforms with public underground concourse between the railway station and the Parliament House. As a result of this $3.5 billion proposal, the Northbound Underground Platform (marked as N), and the Southbound Underground Platform (marked as S), will be changed to Platform 15 and 16 respectively.

BUS & COACH TERMINUS
Immediately outside the railway station, there is a large terminal for some commuter metropolitan buses and intercity coach services that currently has platform configuration of Stance A, B, C and D which will be changed to Platform 17, 18, 19 and 20 respectively.