When I joined the AQCCC, I did so full of goodwill. I would have been very happy to write that we agreed on some great locations for air quality monitoring and that I am confident that we will meet the national air quality standards. Unfortunately, that is not how things turned out.
Instead, the project team demonstrated a distinct lack of determination to secure good locations. It became clear that the project team treated the AQCCC process as basically a box-ticking exercise.
Not only that, but when I did some research and looked into air quality monitoring that has already been done, I discovered that the national air quality standard for the yearly PM 2.5 average was already being breached in Arncliffe and St Peters and probably also in Kingsgrove before construction even started.
We have long term PM 2.5 data for four locations in Sydney: Chullora, Liverpool, Earlwood and Richmond. In all four locations, PM 2.5 levels are trending up.
It is going to be a challenge to bring air pollution figures down to the national air quality standard. But there are definitely a few things that can be done at no cost to the NSW budget.
A lot of traffic (and also traffic jams) in Arncliffe at least are caused by Sydney Airport and by the bottleneck at International Terminal. There is a very simple solution: Remove the surcharge for using the stations at Sydney Airport. If we can't afford the hit to the budget, charge a toll on vehicles using public roads to go to the airport terminals, so that the change is revenue neutral.
In time, the adoption of electric cars and trucks will make a lot of pollution problems go away. But until then, a whole lot of people will suffer poor health outcomes. So we should look for ways to speed up the adoption of electic cars. All sorts of measures with no cost to the NSW budget are possible. Here is a simple one:
Legislate a maximum price for cars with internal combustion engines in NSW. Something like $45000 drive-away for most cars, SUVs and pick-up trucks and a little bit more for genuine three-row people movers. The idea is that someone buying an average family car will be unaffected. But the sort of people willing to splash out on a luxury car can probably afford to buy an electric car. This will build momentum and hopefully cause more average people to buy electric cars.
I know that tolls on regular roads are a very controversial idea. And it is probably not politically possible for most of Sydney. But it could be an option just for St Peters and the surrounding areas. Consider this:
How else are we going to bring pollution in St Peters down to the standard in such challenging circumstances?
The revenue could be used to fund a few smaller interchanges along the New M5 and the M4-M5 link. If drivers can interchange nearer to their journey end points, it will reduce the amount of driving they will do. It is also important to make any decision on tolls on existing roads before the new roads are sold, otherwise we would be handing a windfall to the new owners.