Railway Observations for 2022.

[hugh45]

Trains on the Eastern Suburbs and Cronulla line were running at a reduced service because of the weather. Annoucements were made that trains were running late as a result of the weather. It seemed to me that a number of services were not running at all as I had to wait 25 minutes for a service that normally ran every 10 minutes.

[Aurora]

Correct, reduced services and delays for the remainder of today.

[Campbelltown busboy]

What is the link between the rail network and the Australian Services Union

Saw this at Liverpool today


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Linto63]

What is the link between the rail network and the Australian Services Union

Australian Services Union website explains

[boronia]

The Transport for NSW website says trains are not running between Springwood and Lithgow in either direction due to landslides at Katoomba and Zig Zag. Buses are operating instead.

[Aurora]

Weather impacts significantly impacting the network at nightfall. Speed restrictions across much of the network, likely to continue over the next few days.

[tonyp]

Looking through all the travel alerts for all modes over the past few days, it seems the only one not affected has been Sydney Metro which continues to breeze along. It's only Achilles Heel is going to be the legacy sections inherited from the suburban system. I wonder if they managed to fix that leaking that led to the previous flooding of the ECRL tunnel under the Lane Cove River?

[gilberations]

Looking through all the travel alerts for all modes over the past few days, it seems the only one not affected has been Sydney Metro which continues to breeze along. It's only Achilles Heel is going to be the legacy sections inherited from the suburban system. I wonder if they managed to fix that leaking that led to the previous flooding of the ECRL tunnel under the Lane Cove River?

The ECRL will always have water flowing through it. Something to do with the pressure I was told

[tonyp]

The ECRL will always have water flowing through it. Something to do with the pressure I was told

I understood that some waterproofing lining was not used in the ECRL tunnels, unlike the later metro tunnels. It seems to me though that the worst problem is that, if there is water in the tunnels, a bridge over the Lane Cove River would have drained it away naturally, whereas the tunnel under the river relies on pumps. During the last episode of flooding inside the tunnel that closed down services, these pumps proved inadequate for the task.

[Transtopic]

Looking through all the travel alerts for all modes over the past few days, it seems the only one not affected has been Sydney Metro which continues to breeze along. It's only Achilles Heel is going to be the legacy sections inherited from the suburban system. I wonder if they managed to fix that leaking that led to the previous flooding of the ECRL tunnel under the Lane Cove River?

You would say that wouldn't you, in your unabashed anathema towards anything to do with the legacy rail network, which may I remind you is mostly on the surface and subject to weather events. It still dwarfs the current metro line. Get a grip!

However, I will agree that it was a poor decision by the previous Labor government to build the ECRL (or PRL at the time) under the Lane Cove River instead of the originally proposed high level bridge, which incidentally would have had minimal impact on the Lane Cove National Park. There had also been a long term proposal to build a high level road bridge to link a widened Delhi Rd to the Pacific Hwy/Boundary St intersection at Roseville which has also been abandoned.

I'm still perplexed why the Labor government caved in to the North Shore NIMBYs, when they had nothing to gain politically, as they were never likely to win that seat.

[tonyp]

It still dwarfs the current metro line. Get a grip!

Bear in mind when measuring the two systems alongside each other that the metro will be lifting way way above its weight, so one length of suburban line won't be the equivalent of one length of metro line. When the metro network grows and the development expands along the metro lines, these will be the future heavy lift rail spines of Sydney and the suburban system will become a secondary rail system.

[Linto63]

When the metro network grows and the development expands along the metro lines, these will be the future heavy lift rail spines of Sydney and the suburban system will become a secondary rail system.

Pff, not in this century.

[tonyp]

Pff, not in this century.

Dream on.

[Linto63]

If you are naive enough to belief that all of the lines on the 2056 masterplan are going to be built, then perhaps. But that won't happen.

[tonyp]

If you are naive enough to belief that all of the lines on the 2056 masterplan are going to be built, then perhaps. But that won't happen.

Not even that. Even what is presently in the pipeline, notably the West Metro and the Chatswood-Sydenham section of the Tallawong-Bankstown Metro, will make a huge impression on the parallel suburban lines. Of the major suburban lines, only T4 and T8 will hold their own until further lines in the metro plan are built. The only significant threat to the plan may be every time a Labor government wins office and backs out of public transport in its usual way. It will then be picked up by the subsequent Coalition government.

[Nat]

Certainly is living in fantasy land.
Certainly will be backing away from it when all the extra tax to fund this has to come from liberal voters...

[Merc1107]

Perhaps they could privatise the politicians. All those inefficient hot-air generators, wasting taxpayer's money. We need innovation from the private sector to deliver better value for money

[Frodo]

Trackwork on the T1 north shore line this weekend was initially planned for Berowra-Gordon but was extended to North Sydney for most of Saturday until around 8-9pm due to the recent events in order to inspect the track.

It looks like the speed restrictions on the T1 have now been lifted. Also spotted an 8 car oscar running a Gordon service going through Chatswood northbound around 9.05pm.

[boronia]

Bit of a mess at Central today. Transfer between north concourse (suburban) and grand concourse (country) involved going out the Chalmers St exit, walking around to Eddy Ave and up the stairs/escalators. I guess if you needed a lift you'd have to go all the way to Pitt St.

Services on the T8 were shown on indicators as running ......Wolli Creek, Revesby, East Hills only, with all stops buses from Wolli to Revesby. In reality, the buses were running Wolli to East Hills, with the trains (when they ran) actually terminating at Turella.

[gilberations]

I’ve been told that crew are being blindsided again. Being told randomly to stable trains mid diagram, sometimes mid run, and crew as well as passengers being stranded.

Rumor mill being train crontrol have made too many mistakes in the past few days and are struggling to figure out how to fix it. Expect another whole network shutdown by management, possibly Monday, at which time they’ll assess what is where and where it needs to go, bunch of empty trains runing to reposition for maintenance and next morning peak.

[Aurora]

The problem is the speed restrictions on some parts of the network at night which train planning is not accounting for that in their daily timetables. The trains inevitably end up over an hour late which stuffs up crew positioning. You can only run late trains for so long until crews run out, then they need to stable trains mid-diagram.

[gilberations]

Crewing wasn’t the issue. These were crew who were expecting to continue, crew freshly signed on, crew on their way toward their Home Depot. Just a very strange occurrence. RTBU is announcing that they’re expecting another shutdown, but not by them.

[R44]

RTBU is announcing that they’re expecting another shutdown, but not by them.

Unlike the last time where they, like the rest of Sydney, were blindsided?

[Fleet Lists]

There is an article in today's Telegraph that this time it will be the Electrical Trades Union which will be union involved.

[Glen]

I had to travel home from the airport at 9pm Monday 14/3 and couldn't believe what a mess the trains were in even at that time of night.

My train from Domestic sat idle for 30 minutes because there was a train at every station between there and Central.

Instead I took a train to Wolli Creek and (with my suit case) missed the next Citybound Illawarra train because, can you believe, the UP button in the elevator is missing! (It even has a note stuck to it telling you not to poke your finger into the hole where said button would have once upon a time been).

Then I got to Central and ran my wheeled bag from platform 24 to platform 10 in less than 3 minutes to just make it on to the 10.20pm from Sydney Terminal to Epping (creating a sensation of great relief, given that multiple trains ahead of it and behind it were cancelled) only to find that after the doors closed they announced that train was cancelled too.

Following this, multiple crews, station staff and passengers were wandering around dazed and confused.

Then someone announced there would be a train from platform 18 to Penrith and when I got there staff were advising that as they had no idea when the next train would be, everybody should catch that train no matter where they were going and change to a connection further out - a kind thought but probably wishful thinking on the connection idea.

What's going on - have we suddenly gone back to 1980?