This is what he says about the way motorists have been treated by politicians: "For too long, policy makers have ranked motorists just above heavy drinkers or smokers as social pariahs." And this is what he says about public transport: "In Australia's big cities, public transport is generally slow, expensive, not especially reliable and still a hideous drain on the public purse. Part of the problem is inefficient, overmanned, union-dominated, government-run train and bus systems." Abbott appears to be suggesting that public transport in Australian cities is so unaccommodating, so inefficient, so intimidating for women, it is not worth pursuing as a goal for the federal government. On the other hand, he appears to believe motorists have been mistreated and ostracised by our politicians. Hence his April 2013 claim that the Commonwealth should "stick to our knitting" and focus on road funding. Such generalisations would be laughable were the ramifications not so serious. Since Abbott wrote Battlelines, the population of Melbourne has grown by almost 400,000, with the city swelling by an average of about 1500 people each week. Abbott's suggestion – that we should deal with such problems by building ever more roads to accommodate ever more cars – belongs to another era. So does the notion that building roads produces bigger political gains than public transport. Roads may be part of the solution, but they are far from the only solution. Political parties that put all their eggs in the road basket do so at their own peril.

The former Napthine government learned this the hard way, and was forced to play catch-up in the lead-up to the 2014 election with a series of taxpayer-funded stunts that included handing out mock "tickets" for a rail link to the airport that may or may not have been finished in 2026. Public transport is now a mainstream political issue. It is retail politics at its most basic. It has little to do with the ability to choose your own music, or feeling like a king behind the wheel, or (for women) a sense of security, or choosing your own route. It is simply about the most efficient way to get to work or home. According to Public Transport Victoria, there has been an unprecedented 70 per cent jump in train patronage in the past decade. Modelling undertaken by PTV in late 2012 underscores the future challenge: annual patronage across train, tram and bus services is expected to hit 1 billion trips by 2031. The number of people boarding trains on an average weekday is expected to more than double to 1.7 million passengers per day by 2031. Scary stuff when you think about it. If there was ever a promise that Abbott should break, it is his refusal to fund urban rail projects. If Abbott were to admit he got it wrong, that his thinking has matured in recent years, I think it might go some way towards re-engaging with the voters in the middle who Abbott has comprehensively lost. Abbott's suggestion – that we should deal with such problems by building ever more roads to accommodate ever more cars – belongs to another era.

Victoria's new premier, Daniel Andrews, clearly gets the idea that the public are sick of talk and bickering. This week he announced he would be "fast tracking" $40 million out of a $300 million election commitment to begin planning for the cross city Metro Rail project by setting up a new "Melbourne Metro Rail Authority". The project, which will involve two nine-kilometre rail tunnels from South Yarra to South Kensington with five stations along the way, will be incredibly complex and expensive. Potentially it will mean shutting down Swanston Street for a couple of years. But ultimately it would add capacity for 20,000 extra passenger movements during the daily peak, effectively creating another city loop. Andrews is promising to release expressions of interest next year, with major construction expected to start in 2018. Given we still don't have a clear sense of the route, the design, the business case, or how the project will be funded, this will be a tall order. Opposition Leader Matthew Guy reckons the announcement is another sign that the new government is fast turning Victoria's democracy into a "stuntocracy", claiming it is astounding the project has been announced with no clue about how it will be funded. In some ways, Guy is correct. If Andrews wants major construction work to start in 2018, he will need to fairly quickly find a way of funding the project, given his refusal to risk losing Victoria's AAA credit rating by taking on more debt, and given Abbott's refusal to chip in for commuter rail.

But Guy, too, could do worse than attempting to adopt a more constructive tone. It is terribly important that Victoria doesn't miss out. The public desperately want a mature, rational and transparent discussion about how to deal with Victoria's transport challenges. Inexplicably, it is our political leaders who have been strangely slow to recognise this. Josh Gordon is The Age's state political editor.