Commuters will from Monday be able to travel on driverless trains under Sydney Harbour after a regulator signed off on the delayed opening of the new line.
“We look forward to welcoming passengers on board Sydney’s new railway – from Sydenham to Chatswood – from Monday 19 August,” NSW Transport Minister Jo Haylen announced on X, formerly Twitter, on Thursday evening.
It comes after the state Labor government had to push back the targeted August 4 opening date for the $21 billion addition to Sydney’s Metro network.
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Eleven days after the scheduled launch, the Office of the National Rail Safety Regulator on Thursday confirmed it had finished its safety assessment and approved the publicly owned, privately run metro line to operate.
“A commencement date is a matter for the NSW government,” the regulator said earlier on Thursday before the Minster annnounced services would begin on Monday.
Earlier this month, Haylen had said multiple factors had contributed to the delay including an incident on the existing northwest section of the line, beginning at Tallawong, in which passengers were stuck for hours, and industrial action.
The Fire Brigade Employees Union had imposed a temporary ban on emergency management exercises on the line amid a stoush over pay.
The union on Wednesday had warned the line was still not ready to open after a firefighter received an electric shock during a training exercise earlier in August.
“What if this occurred during an actual incident such as a fire?” the union’s secretary Leighton Drury said at the time.
“This could have devastating consequences for not only firefighters but the general public.”
The city metro project, planned and started under the former coalition government, has been hit with a series of cost overruns since it was approved in early 2017.
The final bill for the Sydney Metro City and Southwest line is expected to be about $21.5 billion, up $9 billion on its initial price tag.
It forms part of a wider rollout of Metro services across the city that combine to constitute the nation’s biggest public transport project.
A Sydney Metro West line will connect the city centre with Parramatta, while a third project will connect St Marys in western Sydney to the region’s new airport.