On Shaky Foundations !

The need to construct Metro West to take crowding off the western rail line to Parramatta will involve extensive tunnelling and station excavation between Westmead and the Bays precinct and all that will start in 2022.  When finished, it is expected to take more than 80,000 vehicles off the road by providing a fast rail link and it will employ ten thousand much needed jobs during construction.

The project is causing apprehension among  property owners living in Parramatta, Clyde, Silverwater, Burwood North, Five Dock and The Bays area. who well remember the cracking and subsidence experienced along the route when light rail was reintroduced in inner Sydney.

The state government is seeking approval for the project and the EIS warns there will be cosmetic damage to buildings along the route, which includes cracking of drywall surfaces, cracking of support columns and loosening of joints.  The inevitable question arises of who will pay for that damage and what accountability will apply  ?

These are Sydney's older suburbs and much of the housing here was constructed with materials which are no longer used.  They are perfectly sound if undisturbed, but if damaged repairs are costly and time consuming.  There is usually conflicts between the home owner and the builders as to the extent of the damage caused.

This comes at a time when the government is introducing reforms to the state building code to try an rectify the type of omissions that caused both the Opel and Mascot Towers tragedies and the fitting of flammable external building cladding that was exposed by the London Grenfell Tower fire in 2017.

Amongst the twenty-two changes to the building code will be a $600 million rectification fund for buildings containing that flammable cladding.  The building code changes will apply to new buildings under construction and will do nothing for those already built and occupied and above the route where these rail excavations will occur.

In recent years Sydney has experienced a high rise revolution.  Developers have bought single dwelling lots and combined them to create apartment towers and now owners fear for their stability if work is constructed underground that disturbs their foundations.  Rectification costs can run to a multi milllion price quotation which is above owners ability to pay.

Owners living in apartments along that new train route have reason to be apprehensive.   The damage to Mascot Towers happened years after the building was constructed and occupied and there is conjecture that excavation for another new building alongside may have contributed to the cause.
The fact that the owners who bought into Mascot Towers in good faith are stuck with the rectification bill brings no comfort to those living above that train route.  The changes to the building code will only safeguard what is yet to be built  !