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The Very Fast Train was a proposed high-speed railway between Melbourne, Canberra and Sydney in south-eastern Australia. Initially conceived by Dr Paul Wild of the CSIRO in 1984, the proposal was adopted by a private-sector joint venture in 1987, comprising Elders IXL, Kumagai Gumi, TNT and BHP. Several major studies were undertaken in the 1980s and early 1990s, which showed the proposal to be both technically and financially feasible. The VFT attracted widespread support from both the general public and sections of government, but the joint venture folded following the failure to secure a favourable taxation agreement with the federal government in late 1991. Other reasons for the scheme's failure were speculated to include a difficult relationship between joint venture members, the deregulation of the Australian airline market, environmental and noise pollution concerns, accusations that the scheme was in fact a disguised land development project, and a lack of planning support from Federal and state governments. The Very Fast Train remains the most substantial investment into a high-speed rail project in Australia, and the only proposal to involve 100% private funding. Although there have been numerous subsequent studies into HSR since the VFT, none have come as close to realisation. Several of the joint venture members went on to propose additional fast-rail projects during the 1990s, but none passed beyond the planning stage. The name "Very Fast Train" or "VFT" has become a synonym for high-speed rail in Australia, though no subsequent proposal has adopted the terminology. ==Origins== An Australian high-speed railway was originally conceived by Dr Paul Wild of the CSIRO in the early 1980s. A lifelong train enthusiast, Dr Wild was excited about the highly anticipated introduction of the new XPT rollingstock to the Sydney-Canberra line. An Australian variant of the British Intercity 125 High Speed Train, the XPT promised a "new rail travel experience". In October 1983, Dr Wild booked a ticket on the first run of the new service from his base in Canberra to a meeting in Sydney. Wild found the XPT disappointing, offering only mild improvements on the existing service. The train only briefly reached its top speed of 160 km/h, was not an express service, and the archaic staff-change at Goulburn was undertaken with "a complete lack of urgency." Dr Wild described the service has having "the leisurely features of a branch-line train". In the end, the service took 4 hours 37 minutes, a dismal 20 minutes longer than scheduled. The average speed of was slower than many trains of the steam era. Disappointed with this state of affairs, Dr Wild wrote to the Chief Executive of the NSW State Rail Authority, David Hill, offering the services of the CSIRO for a project to help the trains run faster; he was initially thinking of something like 3 hours between Sydney and Canberra, a moderate speed upgrade that would make the train competitive with cars and coaches. Despite a cordial meeting between the CSIRO and the Rail Authority on February 29, 1984, it was clear that the Authority considered faster speeds for regional rail a low priority. Nevertheless, Dr Wild was convinced the idea was sound, and continued to explore the possibilities of a fast Sydney-Canberra-Melbourne service in his own time. Initially aiming to achieve a 6-hour service from Sydney to Melbourne, he eventually decided that the goal must be 3 hours, a travel time that would be competitive with air travel. Although this would require a top speed of 350 km/hr, substantially faster than the 270 km/h TGV (the world's then-fastest commercial service), HSR technology was progressing at such a pace to make this a plausible near-term objective. Dr Wild's preliminary analysis indicated that the most favourable route would be via Cooma, Orbost and Gippsland; he bought a set of "about two dozen" 1:100,000 survey maps, tracing out the 7-km radius curves that such speeds would necessitate with 14 cm-diameter dinner plates on his living room floor.〔 When he showed this preliminary route to his colleagues, they were excited by Wild's ideas. At a meeting on 19 April it was agreed to write a report. Dr Wild would write on the broad concept; John Brotchie on the economics and market; and John Nicholson on the technology. Although they had agreed to have drafts ready within six weeks, such was their private enthusiasm that they had each completed a draft within 4 days. Their report, ''A Proposal for a Fast Railway between Sydney, Canberra and Melbourne'', was published by the CSIRO three months later on 26 July 1984. The projected cost was $2.5 billion ($7.2 billion in 2014〔(【引用サイトリンク】 Inflation calculator )〕). The proposed benefits of the railway included increased regional development, relieving congestion of Sydney Airport, reducing reliance on imported fossil fuels, and tourism to the Snowy Mountains and Gippsland regions; the report suggested that the high-speed line could be called the ''Snowy Mountains Express''. The CSIRO later requested funding to undertake a detailed study, estimated to take 12 months and cost $500,000. Although the Prime Minister, Bob Hawke, observed that a fast railway would be very valuable to the Labor government's policy of decentralisation, the bureaucracy was sceptical of the cost assumptions given in the CSIRO's report, particularly earthworks, which they estimated to cost $2.8 billion against the CSIRO's estimate of $800 million (this was due to an assumption, not shared by the government analysis, that high speed trains could withstand short sections of steeper grade than conventional trains). On 12 September 1984, the Transport Minister Peter Morris rejected the proposal, stating in the House of Representatives that he would not recommend "that resources should be allocated to even do a study on it.” As a parting shot, Morris said that "if, as has been suggested by its proponents ... the private sector is interested in it, I would say to Dr Wild that he should take the proposal back to the private sector ... and let them put it forward and fund it." 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Very Fast Train Joint Venture」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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