These are all important initiatives and
while cultural change does not occur
overnight, the Transformation Program
brings a new foundation that presents
exciting prospects.
Looking Ahead
In terms of Transformation, under the
effectiveness and efficiency stream,
we will be driving specific productivity
initatives to ensure effective delivery of
agreed outcomes across the business.
Another key area of effort will be to
continue to align our leadership skills and
style to our customer focus.
In the immediate timeframe our focus
is on business development. We see a
range of opportunities in metropolitan,
regional and intermodal freight
sectors and fully resourced business
development teams were established in
both the Interstate and Hunter Valley
businesses this year to pursue greater
market share.
They join new roles in the commercial,
customer service, logistics and
operations space in both the Hunter
Valley and Interstate Business Units
that will help ARTC deliver a rounded
customer service model.
One initial growth focus area is regional
freight, particularly in NSW where
regional volumes largely flow onto ARTC
mainlines. We also see opportunities
in import/export (IMEX) freight
movements where overall volumes
are projected to grow. Capturing more
interstate freight travelling along the
busy North South freight corridor
between Melbourne, Sydney and
Brisbane also continues to offer strong
growth potential.
Part of taking advantage of these
opportunities is the need to keep
capitalising and leveraging what is now a
very modern and enhanced, multi-billion-
dollar asset base.
For example, we migrated to operating
a single, digital telecommunications
network this year, streamlining
communications for our customers and
also allowing us to implement innovations
like ATMS and a new remote flood
management warning system.
Another critical initiative is the
Inland Rail Programme to which the
Australian Government has committed
$300m to finalise planning, engineering
design and environmental assessments
to start construction.
Since mobilising in mid-2014, ARTC’s
Inland Rail Programme team has
delivered preliminary field work, aerial
photography of the entire alignment
and prepared reference delivery,
procurement, community engagement
and approvals strategies. The first
tenders for the project have been
released and the formal business case
has been completed and submitted to
the Australian Government.
The Advanced Train Management
System (ATMS) has also achieved a
number of milestones in the first stage
of its implementation into live-running
revenue services.
The first part of Implementation Stage
One of the ATMS project has seen
the extension of a rail crossing loop at
Roopena, South Australia completed in
August 2014 and the Adelaide-based
system test and integration facility
commissioned in late 2014. More recently,
ATMS was installed on test locomotives
for live-run testing. The new facility
includes necessary equipment to simulate
real world testing in the operational rail
environment as well as the final ATMS
hardware to conduct tests and trial the
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