The barbeque is cranking and workers are playing on their phones – while the rest of Sydney is stuck in gridlock because of endless tram works.
New photos have laid bare the extent of the city’s $2.1 billion light rail disaster amid a ferocious court stoush and claims the Spanish subcontractor building it is on a ‘go slow’.
Pictures snapped over 24 hours on Thursday and Friday show many CBD work sites, operated by Acciona, were deserted.
It comes as the government was told the project is running a full year late and that the line, stretching from Circular Quay to Randwick, won’t be operational until March 2020.
The delay could have a devastating impact on business owners, many who say they are already being squeezed by landlords as foot traffic is ‘smashed’.
7.40am Friday: A hungry worker (olive oil and BBQ sauce nearby) is seen kicking off a breakfast cook-up at a tram construction office near Anzac Parade, in the city’s east
Breakfast is served in the form of sausage sandwiches, with labourers munching on bread and BBQ sauce before work
Thursday, 12pm: This worker chilled out on his backhoe as traffic snarled and the city streets bustled with foot traffic,
The once-bustling heart of the city’s CBD next to the Queen Victoria Building was (almost) deserted at midday Thursday
Heavy machinery was in place but not much was actually happening at a work site in the centre of the city on Thursday
Labourers leaned against a fence and had a yarn at one of several Circular Quay Acciona sites on Thursday
Angela Vithoulkas, owner of George Street’s VIVO cafe and an independent councillor, said she had only seen a small work crew each day since January.
‘It takes more than three men and a broom to build light rail,’ she told Daily Mail Australia.
She claimed business owners were initially told that each section would take six to nine months. (Major construction works began in October 2015.)
‘I’m not a mathematician but three-and-a-half years is more than six to nine months – and there’s no end in sight,’ Ms Vithoulkas said.
Steve Kulak, owner of Surry Hills’ TITLE bookstore, said work is no longer being done around the clock.
Labourers used to be slaving away for 12 to 18 hours a day. But now it is a 9am to 4pm operation, he said.
‘At the beginning it was on, it was buzzing,’ said Mr Kulak. ‘Now nothing happens at night’.
The government has blamed builder Acciona for hurting businesses with their ‘actions and inactions’.
Got an important call? A labourer takes a break and scrolls through messages on his mobile phone on George Street
Major light rail construction began in October 2015 and the line itself may not start running until March 2020 or later
Another barqueue was made available for staff based near Town Hall, in the centre of the city’s business district
The Sydney Light Rail route would run from Circular Quay in the city’s CBD to Randwick, in the city’s eastern suburbs
Traffic and a lot of mess: Tourists in Sydney’s Harbour-side hotel district are confronted with a large mound of debris
‘It’s very obvious there is a go-slow on this,’ state Transport Minister Andrew Constance told reporters this week.
‘They need to get to work and ramp it up.
‘It was very obvious in the middle of last year they were laying more track than they are now and they need to get to work.
‘They’ve made a claim they’ve got 1400 staff working – they need to prove it’.
Meantime, Labor Opposition Leader Luke Foley branded the city a ‘war zone’.
‘This light rail line will be delivered in the 2020s – at the earliest,’ Mr Foley said at a press conference.
‘It may never be completed the way they’re going.
Helloooooo? Another George Street work site where there was not a single labourer about midday on Thursday
Some parts of the city tram sites have been opened for foot traffic for months. Above, a tradesman takes a break
Midday traffic banked up along George Street towards the south of the city, close to Circular Quay
It was all machinery and very few staff at Circular Quay – the location where the light rail will one day begin
In a statement of claim lodged with the NSW Supreme Court, Acciona has claimed Transport for New South Wales withheld vital information about electricity infrastructure.
It wants another $1.1 billion from the government to finish the project. The government is fighting the claim.
The light rail was originally budgeted to cost $1.6 billion before a $500 million blowout. But Acciona’s new demands would double the original cost.
Mr Constance has said the government still wanted the light rail finished next year.
‘We want to see it delivered in 2019 as per the project deed,’ the minister told Radio 2GB.
One of many traffic controllers and gate operators who are employed on the light rail construction project
Four workers in hard hats laboured away between Essex and Hunter Streets in the CBD on Thursday
Sydneysiders shuffle between deserted work sites on George Street, late on Thursday afternoon
‘We have businesses and residents being hurt by (Acciona’s) actions and inactions,’ the state transport minister has said
‘It is vital that (contractor) ALTRAC accelerate and get on with their program.
‘We have businesses and residents being hurt by their actions and inactions.’
ALTRAC this week said work on the project was taking longer than expected due to design changes and the discovery of ‘unknown utilities’.
The consortium has found more than 1600 unknown services but has still completed about 80 per cent of the utilities work, a spokeswoman said in a statement to the Australian Associated Press.
Some 16 kilometres of track has been laid by Acciona to date amounting to 66 per cent of the route, ALTRAC said.