All around Australia new public transport projects will be funded for the major cities.

Sydney and Brisbane are the exceptions, but at least Queensland received $365 million for a light rail system on the Gold Coast.

All Sydney will get is $91 million towards planning and design work for the West Metro, the proposal for a light rail link between the city and Parramatta.

This is less than 1 per cent of the total funding needed to complete the combined West Metro - CBD Metro rail service.

On post-budget morning, NSW treasurer Eric Roosendaal attempted to explain the crumbs thrown our way by claiming that his state was already spending big on infrastructure and that the other states needed federal assisatnce more than NSW.

The treasurer could not have believed his own words surely?

Last November he cancelled plans for the North West Metro and the South West Rail Link and stalled expenditure on the Clearways rail program citing the state's distressed financial situation.

One wonders if the North West Metro would have received substantial federal budget funding.

Certainly it has many of the same characteristics of the metropolitan rail projects in the other states that have been funded by the budget.

I wonder too, how federal MPs across Labor's heartland in Sydney will explain the poor budget result.

From the city outwards, Sydneysiders are represented by an unbroken block of 16 federal Labor MPs.

This is the largest block of Labor seats in Australia.

This heartland includes housing minister Tanya Plibersek (Sydney), environment minister Peter Garrett (Kingsford Smith), assistant treasurer Chris Bowen (Prospect), attorney general Robert McClelland (Barton), agriculture minister Tony Burke (Watson), home affairs minister Bob Debus (Macquarie), and parliamentary secretaries Laurie Ferguson (Reid) and Maxine McHugh (Bennelong).

This is a long batting line-up capable of big scores.

The Labor heartland also includes infrastructure minister Anthony Albanese whose dream of disbursing a substantial pot of dough for transport and telecommunications infrastructure was shattered by the global recession.

Apparently, though, Mr Albanese saw nothing in Sydney that merited funding.

In the end the national infrastructure spend is modest, sure.

But why was there nought for Australia's largest and Australia's most infrastructure-distressed city?