The Victorian state government has announced the continuation of the Rail Freight Support Package with a $5 million allocation.

 

The package is designed to offset the cost of rail freight transportation and reduce the use of single lane roads by trucks, while subsidizing costs of freight transportation for rural and regional manufacturing in Victoria.  The program was introduced in 2008 by the Labor government with funding of $21.4million.

 

Incentives provided through the package include:

 

  • reduced access fees to the Vline network for grain trains
  • a rebate for container freight carried on rail services from Warnambool, Horsham, Mildura and Shepparton/Tocumwal

 

The Victorian Minister for Public Transport Terry Mulder said the Rail Freight Support Package had kept freight on rail and off Victoria's roads, and the government's aim was to increase the amount of freight carried by rail in Victoria.

 

"The Victorian Government wants to work in partnership with container terminal operators such as Wimmera Container Terminal at Horsham (who will move to Dooen), Wakefield's at Merbein, Gray's at Tocumwal and Wettenhall's at Warrnambool who shift about 35,000 containers each year in total by rail," he said.