The final section of Sydney’s $30 billion M1 metro rail line will open to passengers on Friday, October 30, ending more than two years of major disruptions for commuters who have been forced to catch replacement buses in the south-west.
The NSW government confirmed the date for the opening of the 13-kilometre stretch of the metro rail line between Sydenham and Bankstown in a posting to one of Premier Chris Minns’ social media accounts. The premier will hold a press conference on Thursday to announce the opening.
The long-awaited opening has hinged on approval for passenger services by the national rail regulator, which was last week handed the final safety case and supporting evidence by the M1 line’s private operator, Metro Trains Sydney.
It is later than a target date of “mid-October”, which was detailed in confidential Sydney Metro documents earlier this year.
The ribbon cutting for the metro line on October 30 will come just over two weeks before a new rail timetable for the Sydney Trains network is introduced. This will have the greatest impact to services on the T4 Eastern Suburbs and Illawarra line.
As part of the timetable changes on November 15, all T4 trains will stop at Sydenham station to enable passengers to switch to driverless trains on the M1 metro line.
To assure safety regulators, the government will keep a tiny fraction of the 360 platform screen doors closed when the south-west section opens. Three screen doors will remain closed at Dulwich Hill station, and one each at Canterbury, Campsie and Marrickville to reduce the risk of “even minor safety issue”.
Curved platforms have required 170 mechanical gap fillers to be installed at eight stations. The small hydraulic platforms extend to the metro carriages before screen doors open, ensuring that commuters can safely step on and off.
The opening of the M1 line’s south-west section will finally put an end to pink-coloured replacement buses, which have significantly lengthened commuters’ trips along the corridor and cost taxpayers about $200 million.
Tens of thousands of commuters have had to catch the replacement buses each day between Sydenham and Bankstown since September 2024, when the T3 heavy rail line was shut to complete the final 13-kilometre section of the M1 line.
In mid-2018, the former Coalition government told commuters that the line would need to be closed for three to six months. Even before it closed in September 2024, the Minns government said the shutdown might last longer than its earlier estimates of 12 months.
The total cost of the city and south-west sections of the 66-kilometre M1 line is forecast to cost as much as $23 billion, up from $21.6 billion previously.