The federal government says it is "serious" about building high-speed rail between Newcastle and Sydney and will bring forward a business case for the project to this year.
High-speed rail on a new dedicated route could cut travel times to Sydney to 45 minutes, but the long-awaited project will come with an eye-watering price tag.
Just how expensive the line will be could become clearer by the end of the year.
Former High Speed Rail Authority acting chief executive Andrew Hyles told a recent infrastructure summit that the business case would be done by 2026.
But Infrastructure Minister Catherine King revealed during a visit to the Hunter with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese on Tuesday that the timeline for the business case had been brought forward.
"What the expectation is this year is the business case will be done, planning work undertaken, technical work undertaken and also recommendations to government about how the project is financed," she said.
"This is a very big project. It's a project we're very serious about building the Newcastle to Sydney component via obviously the Central Coast as well."
Ms King's office confirmed the minister had been referring to a business case for the Sydney-Newcastle leg of the proposed east coast high-speed rail network.
Ms King said she expected the High Speed Rail Authority would open an office in Newcastle.
Completing the business case this year would give the government something tangible to present to voters before the next election in early 2025.
The government has committed to spending $500 million on early planning and corridor works on the Sydney-Newcastle section, a project estimated to cost tens of billions of dollars.
The Grattan Institute published a report in 2020 which argued high-speed rail was too expensive to be viable in Australia due to the nation's widely spread population.
Mr Albanese, a vocal supporter of high-speed rail since he was transport minister in the Rudd and Gillard governments more than 10 years ago, said on Tuesday that bullet trains were "now operating in every inhabited continent on the planet".
"It's being expanded in South America, North America, Asia, Europe and Africa," he said.
"There is no reason whatsoever why, because of the population of Australia and its location around the east coast, this can't be a transformative project for city-to-city travel but also a transformative project in regional economic development.
"That's the thing that really lifts up the benefit-cost ratio of the project."
Ms King said she had met with the High Speed Rail Authority's first chief executive, Tim Parker, on his first day on the job on Monday.
"We are very determined to get this project done but to do it right and deliver here for the people of Newcastle," she said.
