Yes that‘s a project that has been going on for over a decade and has cost billions. And it was done primarily to solve traffic issues rather than benefit the railway (although obviously it has done the latter).
90 per cent of the benefit of level crossing removals is to motorists.
It's often slower for rail passengers to reach their train: they must climb stairs/use a long ramp or lift to reach.
In Melbourne, many rebuilt stations were at ground level and hence easy to access (apart from level crossing gates shutting before a train was due, so you could be trapped on the wrong side) are now less convenient.
One strange problem for motorists with these level crossing abolitions is that where there were previously boom barriers and pedestrian gates to cross the railway, now there's a set of traffic lights for pedestrians to cross the road to access the railway station.
So sometimes the time saving for motorists is eliminated.
The projects are union controlled (aligned with Victoria's socialist Labor state government) and have typically run massively over budget, as has almost every other rail and road project. Victoria has the highest (and growing) debt of any Australian state, and the highest unemployment rate despite the government showering $$$ in every direction including on these infrastructure projects.
The design of stations vary: some are reasonably pleasing but others are a wasteland of concrete. When the rail line is placed underneath the road, and new cuttings created (stupidly now called 'trenches'), they use an ugly material called Shotcrete to line the vertical or angled walls. An affront to the eye.
In contrast, in booming Perth (Western Australia not Scotland), some newly created cuttings have been planted with Australian natives that bind the soil. Far more aesthetically pleasing.
When the rail lines are newly elevated, noise issues for residents result. One infamous case has apartments within five metres of trains, the latter on a viaduct:
Reservoir residents say the government has ignored their concerns about noise and loss of privacy as trains, commuters now metres from their bedroom windows.
www.abc.net.au
Not all these level crossing removal projects have 'finished early': it's possible that construction timelines were deliberately conservative to make it easy for such claims to be aired.
By the way, Melbourne still has two at-grade level crossings in the suburbs of Kooyong (Glen Waverly line) and Riversdale (Alamein line) where trams cross. There were four, but two have been abolsihed with these level crossing removals, so if you'd like to see the two operating, don't wait 20 years to visit. This must be rare internationally.
