A state obtains Commonwealth capital for an urban public transport project

The business case and the construction are both excluded here. What is left is the Commonwealth decision chain — and its longest single wait is waiting for a Budget. At the end of it, the Commonwealth has paid for a structure and nobody has paid for a service.

infrastructureOne major urban public transport project above the Infrastructure Australia evaluation threshold skeleton compare across jurisdictions

This is a structural skeleton, not a measured process. The steps, the authorities and the sequence are researched from this jurisdiction's published requirements and are broadly right. The durations are a uniform template applied across all jurisdictions, so the differences between them on the comparison page are mostly an artefact of that template rather than evidence about Australia. Do not quote the day counts. Replacing them with sourced figures for even one jurisdiction would make this page genuinely useful.

480 days elapsed
longest dependent chain

6 discrete steps
across 3 bodies

38% waiting on availability
scheduling or queue, not assessment

0 days saved by concurrency
vs. 480 if run end-to-end

Where the time goes

Critical-path days only. Steps that run alongside others are real work but do not lengthen the process, so counting them here would overstate the prize.

scheduling	180d	Waiting for a person or committee to become available.
assessment	150d	Someone is genuinely evaluating the merits.
third party	120d	Waiting on an external body outside the regulator's control.
applicant	30d	Waiting on the applicant to supply or fix something.

180 of 480 elapsed days are spent waiting for a person or a meeting rather than for a judgement to be formed. Removing that time changes no assessment standard and lowers no bar -- it is the cost of scheduling alone.

The process, step by step

Applies when: A state or territory seeks Commonwealth capital contribution to an urban public transport project.

#	Step	Who	Why it waits	Clock	Typical	Basis
1	Submit the business case to Infrastructure Australia application Proposals seeking more than $250 million in Commonwealth funding are submitted for evaluation.	Infrastructure Australia	applicant	—	30 legislated	Infrastructure Australia Act 2008 (Cth)
2	Infrastructure Australia evaluation assessment Independent assessment of the proposal's strategic fit, deliverability and economic case. after Submit the business case to Infrastructure Australia 330d slack	Infrastructure Australia	assessment	—	120 estimate	—
3	Commonwealth Budget decision decision A funding commitment is made in a Budget. Budgets happen once a year. after Infrastructure Australia evaluation 150d slack	Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, Communications and the Arts	scheduling	—	180 estimate	—
4	Project funding agreement executed registration A project schedule under the Federation Funding Agreement on Land Transport Infrastructure Projects. after Commonwealth Budget decision 30d slack	Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, Communications and the Arts	third party	—	120 estimate	—
5	First milestone payment registration after Project funding agreement executed	Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, Communications and the Arts	assessment	—	30 estimate	—
6	Services run on the completed asset registration The Commonwealth's involvement ends at construction. The recurrent cost of running the service begins here and does not end. after First milestone payment	State transport agency	assessment	—	0 estimate	—

on the critical path scheduling/queue = delay not caused by the assessment itself

Proposed changes

The longest wait in Commonwealth infrastructure funding is waiting for a Budget resequence ~90d
A proposal that clears evaluation in June is not refused. It waits for the next Budget. Same project, same merits, up to a year of difference depending on when the paperwork landed.
The only Commonwealth instrument for urban public transport can buy concrete and nothing else threshold
$84 billion committed across 81 projects, $13.5 billion to the states in 2026-27, all of it paid against construction milestones. Fares recover 20 to 25 cents in the dollar of operating cost and the Commonwealth funds none of the rest.

Sources

Infrastructure Australia Act 2008 (Cth)
National Land Transport Act 2014 (Cth)
Infrastructure Australia evaluates proposals that are nationally significant or seeking more than $250 million in Commonwealth investment, raised from $100 million
Federation Funding Agreement Schedule on Land Transport Infrastructure Projects 2024-2029, in effect 11 August 2024
Farebox recovery in Australian cities is around $0.20 to $0.25 of every $1 of operating expenditure
The Infrastructure Investment Program provides capital funding to states and territories, paid against project milestones under project funding agreements

Something wrong here?

This page is wrong in some way -- every page like it is. If you have run this process, the most useful thing you can do is tell us which step took longer than we say and why. Edit data/processes/au-urban-transport-capital.toml and open a pull request, or send us the correction.