increase rail volume above economic
growth, in line with existing capacity
and investment.
The economic context has also proven
particularly challenging with rail
freight tonnes heading to Western
Australia reducing by 2.75 percent
this year — a trend reflected across
all transport modes supplying our
western-most state.
This past financial year has also seen a full
year of the new maintenance workforce
being imbedded in-house for large areas
of the East West network. With the first
year completed, each of the teams are
starting to realise their capacity, strengths
and opportunities and the way they
have integrated into normal day-to-day
business has been particularly pleasing
and represents a real achievement for the
East West corridor.
In February, the Australian and
Queensland Governments also invited us
to consider the opportunities offered by
the Queensland regional freight network,
and we have had a project team assessing
this through the latter half of the year.
COMMUNITY AND ENVIRONMENT
We recognise the impact that our
operations have on the communities
living alongside our network throughout
Australia and are committed to working
closely with our customers, regulators
and the community to respond to
concerns about rail noise, vibration,
construction impacts and emissions in
line with our requirements with respective
state regulators.
We are progressing a number of important
initiatives in sections of our network to
manage these potential impacts.
In the Hunter Valley, we are supporting
the NSW Environment Protection
Authority in their efforts to bring
an evidence based approach to the
discussion of air quality emissions and,
together with industry, participate in a
working group led by the Minerals Council
in NSW that is undertaking further
research into the sources of coal dust
along the rail corridor.
In addition, we are working with the
industry to trial a rail noise abatement
project in the Hunter Valley and we
continue to invest in track lubricant and
wayside monitoring systems to address
specific noise challenges in parts of our
Interstate network.
We also continue to actively engage
with communities where issues
arise - across our network – and this
has included ongoing investment in
community relations support and
practical measures to resolve issues
such as noise mitigation, in places
like the Adelaide Hills and Hunter
Valley, as well as monitoring and
reporting on activities through our
licence conditions with respective
Environment Protection Authorities.
LOOKING TO THE FUTURE
As the national freight task continues
to grow, we remain well placed to
respond and capture an increasing
share of this volume and leverage
off our investments, accompanied
by a customer-centric approach and
9
