Minister for Transport and Infrastructure Andrew Constance has today announced timetable improvements for parts of the rail network to boost capacity and cut travel times for some longer distance customers.
The improvements will be introduced from Monday 17 October and will apply to customers travelling on the T4 Eastern Suburbs & Illawarra, South Coast and Blue Mountains lines. The key benefits include:
- T4 Eastern Suburbs & Illawarra Line:
- Three additional all stop trains between Bondi Junction and Hurstville in the PM peak, doubling the number of trains on the T4 Eastern Suburbs & Illawarra Line departing Central between 3.15pm and 3.45pm.
- The new services will enable four existing Cronulla and Waterfall bound services to stop at fewer stations, resolving existing crowding experienced on these services and reducing journey times for some customers by up to eight minutes.
- South Coast Line:
- More frequency, capacity and reduced journey times on Illawarra line services between 3.15pm and 3.45pm will reduce crowding currently experienced on South Coast line services.
- Four express services stopping at Austinmer Station will be permanently introduced into the timetable following a recent review.
- Blue Mountains Line:
- The 3.18pm Blue Mountains weekday service from Central to Lithgow will start operating as an eight car train instead of a four car train, doubling the number of seats available for customers. There will be up to 2080 additional seats for customers every week.
“Patronage on our rail network continues to grow and while we get on with delivering major infrastructure projects like Sydney Metro as well as building new suburban trains, we have to look at other ways we can use our existing network more effectively,” Mr Constance said.
“Travel patterns are changing. There are now more day trippers, school children and those working flexible hours who want to leave the city earlier so a big part of these improvements are to cater for the changing needs of customers.
“We will continue to monitor the network to identify where we can deliver further improvements to current services.”
A number of trains will have changes to their departure times with customers advised to plan ahead by visiting transportnsw.info or by checking updated timetable booklets and online trip planning tools.
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