It’s been a long time coming and a few false starts, but this morning, the opening date for Sydney Metro – the superfast transport system set to transform the way we travel across the city – has been properly confirmed. The City Section of the M1 metro line (running from Chatswood to Sydenham, extending the existing route between Tallawong and Chatswood) will open on Monday, August 19, 2024. That means just two days left battling the bus routes – lap up those clunky journeys before they’re a distant memory.
After extensive safety testing pushed back the opening date of Sydney Metro (it was initially due to open on August 4), final approval has now been granted by the national independent safety regulator, and the new line will start welcoming passengers from Monday morning. This central stretch of Sydney Metro – running through the heart of the city and under Sydney Harbour – has been described by Minister for Transport Jo Haylen as “the biggest change to Sydney’s public transport system since the opening of the Sydney Harbour Bridge”.
If you want to be among the first passengers on Sydney’s shiny new system, you’ll need to wake up early. The first new metro train open to the public will set off from Tallawong Station at 4.38am on Monday morning, and from Sydenham Station at 4.54am. This schedule will continue for the first four weeks of operation, and from mid-September, services will commence at Tallawong Station earlier, at 4.08am and at Sydenham Station at 4.54am seven days a week.
As the new trains start welcoming the public, so too will their sparkly, futuristic new stations – with North Sydney’s Victoria Cross Station housing an impressive new dining precinct, and the futuristic superhub at Martin Place set to feature 3,000sqm of retail and dining outlets over three floors.
The new driverless train system will allow Sydneysiders to zip around the city at record speed – with 2,645 new metro services set to travel through the heart of the city each week, moving 17,000 people each way every hour during the morning peak. Predicted journey times for the Sydney Metro City and Southwest line include:
- Castle Hill to Martin Place in 35 minutes
- Macquarie University to Central in 26 minutes
- Chatswood to new city station Gadigal in 13 minutes
- North Sydney’s Victoria Cross under the harbour to new station Barangaroo in 3 minutes
- Central to Martin Place in 4 minutes
- Central to Sydenham in 7 minutes
- Sydenham to Chatswood in 22 minutes
Next, work will begin on transforming the stretch of line between Sydneyham and Bankstown – a project that will see the T3 Bankstown Line close for up to 12 months, with trains replaced with buses and active transport links (more on that here).
Want more metro insights? Check out our answers to the big questions here, or learn all there is to know and plan your journey via the Transport for NSW website here.
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