The Cook Government has committed $10 million to finalise the planning, design, and approvals for a METRONET station at Karnup, to be built on the corner of Paganoni Road and Mandurah Road. Works are expected to start in 2028.
The finished station is costed at $156 million. Once it opens, the trip from Karnup into Perth will take about 46 minutes, and residents will be able to travel anywhere on the network for as little as $2.80 under the Go Anywhere Fare.
Karnup will sit between Warnbro and Lakelands on the Mandurah Line, in what is currently the longest gap between two stations anywhere on Perth’s metropolitan rail network. The Liberal Party, which made its own commitment to the station a week before this announcement, puts that gap at about 14 kilometres, with residents in Karnup, Golden Bay, Singleton, and Secret Harbour facing a bus trip of roughly 20 to 25 minutes to reach either station.
The station will also have a bus interchange with at least eight stands, a dedicated pick-up and drop-off area, and more than 400 parking bays.
How it’s being paid for
The $10 million is spread across 2026-27 and 2027-28, and covers the Public Transport Authority completing final planning, designs, and approvals. The rest of the $156 million isn’t locked in. The State Government intends to fund half the project through land sales in the region, and will ask the Commonwealth for the balance through future Budget processes.
“With new housing developments in the process of being finalised, we will continue to see local public transport patronage grow and so the time is right to deliver Karnup Station,” Transport Minister Rita Saffioti said.
Increased housing, increased demand
Planning has been finalised for a 39-hectare housing precinct next to the station site, expected to deliver more than 800 homes. The Government plans to sell that precinct in the final quarter of this year, with the proceeds going towards the station itself.
Around it, DevelopmentWA has partnered with Mirvac on the first 1,500 homes of a 4,000-home joint venture across a 484-hectare master-planned community, and Golden Group has released 1,235 lots on Redwood Avenue off Mandurah Road. All of it sits inside a wider Karnup District Structure Plan, due to go to government later this year, that could eventually deliver up to 20,000 homes.
Karnup has been flagged as a priority growth corridor for years, largely because of what’s being built nearby. The defence precinct at Henderson and the Westport container terminal at Kwinana are both expected to generate thousands of jobs within reach of it.
Karnup and the Secret Harbour by-election
Karnup was a Labor commitment at the 2017 state election, then shelved when the federal Coalition government put its money into Lakelands instead, covering 80% of that station’s cost. Lakelands was completed and opened in 2023.
Last Monday, WA Liberal leader Basil Zempilas committed a future Liberal government to building it.
“Labor promised Karnup Station in 2013, again in 2017 and again in 2021,” Zempilas said. “Nearly a decade after Labor came to government, there is still no money in the State Budget, no construction timetable and no delivery date.”
That was said a week before the Cook Government put $10 million on the table, and there is now a construction start date attached. There still isn’t a projected completion date, or a confirmed source for roughly half the money.
Karnup sits in the electorate of Secret Harbour, where a by-election will be held on August 29th following the resignation of Paul Papalia in July. A record 16 candidates are set to contest the seat. The Liberal candidate is Rockingham councillor Ryan Robertson.
“People in Secret Harbour and surrounding suburbs are tired of being told Karnup Station is coming,” Robertson said. “They have watched Labor make the same promise election after election while the station has remained unfunded and undelivered.”
