Upgrading the railway line

There's been some publicity locally about a lot of money being spent on the local railway line.   I previously mentioned this here.  True, I'm aware that some modifications are required on the line so that a wider range of trains can operate on it, although $100 million seems a lot of money.  But there are some marginal seats along the line, and an election is getting closer.  Big amounts of money like this always scare me, but perhaps in the minds of our leaders, big figures are "impressive"?

However, it seems that some of work being undertaken isn't strictly needed, such as painting.  I'm only an observer, but it does appear to me that the paintwork at our local station was in reasonable shape - yet a crew has been here for days, re-painting.  On the other hand, maintenance on other parts of the network is said to be suffering, as Marcus Wong points out.  Is there an issue about priorities here?