Sunshine Station Redevelopment

Even if you haven’t seen any of the info put out by Brimbank Council or the Regional Rail Link Alliance (RRLA), it’s pretty hard not to notice that something is happening to Sunshine Railway Station.

Platform 1, Sunshine Station – Dec 2012

It has been public information for the last year or so that Sunshine Station would be redeveloped as part of the RRLA project.

RRLA have released some very pretty ‘artists impressions’ of the works, showing that we can likely expect some improvements – creation of an open, well-lit overpass to replace the current  dank underpass; revamped platforms and facilities built to comply with the Disability Discrimination Act (DDA); increased shelter etc.

However, even though work has started, I am unable to find any plans on display anywhere!  The artists impressions make it hard to determine which direction they are even taken from and I am none the wiser as to how access from City Place will look, what the parking arrangements will be nor how complimentary the design will be to heritage features of State significance such as the Sunshine Signal Box.

I wonder if any of the resident reps on the various ‘consultation’ groups for council or RRLA have been given any more detail.  And if so, is it publicly available?

I sought more info via the Sunshine Town Centre Structure Plan, adopted by Brimbank Council in October 2012 but that is basically a vision statement to guide policy development – it contains no actual details. For example:

“The redevelopment of the Sunshine Railway Station and interchange presents a significant opportunity to reconnect the adjacent urban fabric and enhance the precinct’s legibility”.

I have no idea what that means.

I’ve seen requests on Twitter for plans by other local residents.  Has anyone else been able to find more detail anywhere?  I’m not even sure of the timelines for the various stages of development.

ETA:  Thanks to LeadWestLtd for a link to the Thiess website showing this:

Dec 2011 – RRLA mock up of Sunshine Station

Surprisingly, when you click on it to play the video, you get a video of the redevelopment of Footscray Station.  I noted a similar thing when RRLA were offering free coffee on Platform 1 at Sunshine just before Xmas. They had a couple of information boards on display but the only one with station redevelopment info was about Footscray.

It raised the suspicion that inspired this post.  That redevelopment of Sunshine station is being done on the run… without consultation and solely with the intent of meeting budget and timeframe requirements.  I doubt very much that through this process I will discover that residents and stakeholders have been kept adequately informed.

Update 2 Jan: I made contact with the Footscray to Deer Park RRLA today who have advised that the plans for Sunshine station have “only recently been finalised”. They stated that they are still working on getting the right information up on the website as they “..need to convert some of the design drawings we have to more web-friendly diagrams/maps and will work on that immediately that the team returns from the Christmas break”.  So it looks like we may get to see something sometime (I imagine Christmas break ends 7th or 14th Jan, then the time to do the conversions…).

However, they are setting up an information stand this Friday 4th Jan at the regular street market in Sunshine (10 am to 2 pm). They invite residents to come down and speak to them there – they will have some design drawings available for viewing.  They are also hoping to have ready a fly-through animation of the new station.

I work full time in the CBD so no way I can get there but if you happen to go, I’d love to hear about it.