Overview
Fridays are great, except for when your morning trip to work takes much longer than expected. That's the scenario many Sydney commuters faced this morning — Friday, August 23 — when the train network was hit by major delays because of a mechanical issue at Town Hall.
As it turns out, it was quite the issue as the delays are set to continue into the evening commute.
Make sure your phone's got a lot of juice — or you've at least got a book with you — because Transport for NSW is currently reporting major delays on the T1 North Shore and Western Line, T2 inner West and Leppington Line, T3 Bankstown Line, T4 Eastern Suburbs and Illawarra Line, T8 Airport and South Line and T9 Northern Line. Yep, that's six out of nine inner city train lines.
If you're heading out of town this evening, you should be ok unless you're planning to jump on the Central Coast to Newcastle train — that one has been hit by big delays, too.
This morning's incident continues to delay our services into this afternoon's peak. The Rail Operations Centre is working on a plan to run a frequent service on all lines.
Please consider travelling home earlier/later or delay any non-essential travel. Updates to follow. pic.twitter.com/EfFeOpiB4l
— Trains Info (@TrainsInfo) August 23, 2019
Travellers are being advised to either leave work early, head home later or avoid travelling at all if possible. You'll definitely need to allow plenty of extra time for travel, and make sure you listen to announcements and check indicator boards as trains may have altered stopping patterns.
At the moment, the delays don't seem to have hit buses, so, if you're travelling to or from North Sydney you could try the 290, M20, 343 or 263. This morning saw long lines for buses, though, so you can probably expect the same to happen in the after-work rush.
The delays come after trains were stopped between Town Hall and North Sydney for over three hours while an electrical crew worked to repair a loose hatch on a train, which was close to overhead wiring. While the mechanical issue was repaired at around 8.45am, but the flow-on effect has been huge.
Here are some pictures of just how close this hatch was to 1500 volts of overhead wiring today.
It appears that something has struck this hatch prior to arriving at Town Hall. We're investigating.
As you can understand, we needed to isolate the power before starting repairs. pic.twitter.com/Px3YkkPDck
— Trains Info (@TrainsInfo) August 23, 2019
To stay up-to-date with delays, check the Transport for NSW website and real-time apps.
Image: This line for buses at Newtown Station this morning, by Quinn Connors.