I’ve always been curious as to the purpose of it – when I first saw it, I thought it was for a pipeline of some description.

Regional Rail Link did add a few piecemeal pieces of cycling infrastructure:

http://www.regionalraillink.vic.gov.au/construction/cycling

However there are still gaps at the city end:

http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/western-suburbs-cyclists-will-get-their-own-offroad-path-to-the-cbd-20141115-11neo6.html

Along new railway from Deer Park to West Werribee, they didn’t build a path, but have included a bike path sized tunnel at each road overpass for the future:

https://www.railgeelong.com/gallery/regional-rail-link/tarneit/F111_2964.jpg.html

one problem with cycleways, i find, is if you take the cycle way along the ring road between edgars road and hume freeway, is access. i will give an example, lets say you start riding from edgars road just north of the freeway, you ride down and between edgars and main st around the corner on the hume freeway, there is only one exit into the residential area. then you have a freeway overpass around this point, but its ages away from any access points. these paveways have terrible access. then you follow the path up and next exit is barry road, after that you have a new housing estate, no access, except for a hole cut into the fence. what the problem is, these cycleways are just chucked in randomly as a sweetener for road spending, they are incredibly poorly designed, have next to zero access, and are useless as a walking track, something i note most of all, having walked one of these is you feel lonely, like youve entered a zone where nobody goes, because crap i never saw a single bike in an hour and a half.

Jacob,

I used the word “route”, not cycleway. 🙂

Future infrastructure development could, IMO, include a path along a possible Attwood Connector. Several kms of the existing route however, are on-road (eg through Lalor and Thomastown).

But don’t forget the new Airport Drive and the M80 Trail (Metro Ring Road) is path all the way except for the older section of Airport Drive (and a small section of a local street in Jacana).

Having a cycleway along railway lines is a great idea… If they follow the same contours and don’t have silly hills at cuttings, etc.

or we could just continue to enforce the helmet law requiring everyone to wear one, and if you dont, thats your problem.