Railways in Melbourne
In February 2015, the State Government established the Melbourne Metro Rail Authority to oversee planning for new twin 9-kilometre rail tunnels through the central city between South Kensington station and South Yarra. The new Metro Tunnel will have five new underground stations and connect the Pakenham and Cranbourne lines with the Sunbury line, creating a new route through the CBD as an alternative to the City Loop. New underground stations will be created at Arden, Parkville, Domain and two new CBD stations, State Library and Town Hall. Enabling works were underway by 2016 and major construction work on the tunnel and stations began in 2017.The project has an estimated cost of $11 billion and is scheduled to be complete by 2025.
Wellington Urban Motorway
Meanwhile, the original plans to extend the motorway beyond Willis Street had been significantly reviewed, with a new plan for an "arterial extension" at a 70 km/h standard proposed along the motorway alignment towards the existing Mount Victoria Tunnel (the original full motorway plan had been scrapped, as it would've meant the destruction of the Basin Reserve, and an unaffordable duplicate Mount Victoria Tunnel). That plan was shelved in 1993 because of funding constraints at the time. Transit New Zealand prioritised a three-stage approach to addressing the traffic issues between the Terrace Tunnel and the Mt Victoria Tunnel: