In the late 1980s, the Darling Harbour area was redeveloped. Instead of being the home of shipping wharves, warehouses and the rail lines leading into them, it became a recreational and commercial area. To get people from the city into Darling Harbour it was decided to build a monorail.

Unfortunately the monorail was never a booming success. There was significant civil opposition to it from the outset on aesthetic grounds but the bigger problem was that the price of a fare was quite high compared to the value that you got from it. Last year the government decided to close down the monorail effective from 30 June this year. Demolition work has been proceeding over the last couple of months and here we see the former Darling Harbour Station, the rail leading to and extending from it having been stripped out, and the station itself in the process of demolition. It's now nothing more than a hollow tube.

The downside to all of this is that while the monorail wasn't a brilliant solution to the transport problem, at least it was a solution. I recall that I used to catch it down to the Exhibition Centre in Darling Harbour back in the late 90s to visit computer exhibitions, in the days when those were still held. The only other realistic option to get there from the CBD (where I worked at the time) was to walk. Which was of course quite doable for someone who is young(ish) and fit, but by the time you got there you wouldn't necessarily feel like walking another couple of kilometres around the various display stands. For those of more advanced years and who don't have the option of walking (did I mention that most of the route is not undercover?), I foresee substantial difficulties indeed for them to get to Darling Harbour. I suppose that they can still go to Central and catch the tram back, but it's a much longer journey (and still involves considerably more walking) than the monorail used to.

The monorail wasn't necessarily a bad idea, but the implementation wasn't great. And it's demolition leaves a bloody great hole in the public transport network between the CBD and Darling Harbour. Much like the hole that you're looking through here.