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T3 Bankstown Line
| Ownership and operation | |
|---|---|
| Controlling authority | Transport for NSW |
| Operator(s) | Sydney Trains |
| Technical | |
| Number of stops | 33 |
The T3 Bankstown Line is a commuter rail line serving Canterbury-Bankstown and parts of the Inner West and Western Sydney regions of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. The line forms part of the Sydney Trains network and is coloured orange on maps and informational material. The Bankstown railway line is the physical railway line which carries the section of the Bankstown Line between Sydenham and Birrong.
History
- F1 Manly
- F2 Taronga Zoo
- F3 Parramatta River
- F4 Cross Harbour
- F5 Neutral Bay
- F6 Mosman Bay
- F7 Double Bay
- F8 Cockatoo Island
Railway line history
The Bankstown railway line opened between Sydenham on the Illawarra railway line and Belmore in 1895.[1] This was the second solely suburban line to open in Sydney, following the North Shore railway line in 1890–all other rail lines were mainlines carrying traffic into and out of Sydney. In 1909, the line was extended to Bankstown, with intermediate stations at Lakemba and Punchbowl. In 1916, the Metropolitan Goods railway line was constructed, running parallel to the Bankstown Line between Marrickville and Campsie. A second extension, from Bankstown to Birrong, opened in 1928. This provided connections to the main suburban railway at Lidcombe and the main south line to Liverpool. A new station between Lakemba and Punchbowl at Wiley Park opened in 1938.
In 1926 the Bankstown Line became the second line in Sydney to be electrified and a maintenance depot was constructed at Punchbowl. Electrification was extended from Bankstown to Regents Park in 1939.[2] The Punchbowl Maintenance Depot closed in 1994.
In January 2006 a four-year project to upgrade the line was completed. The work included the resleepering of the entire line, replacing the former wooden sleepers with the more durable concrete ones, replacement and upgrade of the signalling, and also replacement of the overhead wiring, mostly with the more modern double contact wire variety. The lengthy upgrade process was noted for its "January Closedowns", in which the entire line was closed in January for the bulk of the upgrade work to take place.
Commuter line history
Electric passenger services operated along the Bankstown Line to Wynyard station until the 1956 opening of Circular Quay station and the completion of the City Circle. In 1979 with the opening of the Eastern Suburbs railway line the direction around the City Circle reversed with trips from Bankstown going to St James first and vice versa.
Operation of the Bankstown Line had been tied to the operation of all stations services on the Main Suburban railway line between Lidcombe and the City (marketed as the Inner West Line). Services consisted of a mixture of "Bankstown loop" trains (City - Sydenham - Bankstown - Lidcombe - Strathfield - City) and trains from both sides of the loop (Birrong or Regents Park) heading to Sefton and then further west. Until the early 2000s, a number of Bankstown trains continued via the Western Line to Blacktown via Granville and Parramatta.
A new timetable released in October 2013 broke the loop between the two lines. As part of the Rail Clearways Program, new turnbacks were constructed at Lidcombe and Homebush to allow the separation of both lines and increase their reliability and frequency. Services were also changed to operate mostly around the City Circle via Town Hall on weekdays (rather than via Museum). As part of the timetable change, a new numbering system was also introduced and the line was given the number T3. A sextuplication project between Erskinevile and Sydenham was also proposed as part of the Rail Clearways Program, but was cancelled in 2011. It was intended to separate Bankstown line services from those operating towards East Hills. The 2013 timetable see most East Hills line trains using the Airport line to access the city.
The line was depicted in a brown colour in the early 1990s[3] before being changed to a purple colour around 2000,[4] before it became the current orange colour (which later became orange-red).
Future projects
Sydney Metro City & Southwest is a project to convert the Sydenham to Bankstown section of the line to use single deck metro trains. A new tunnel is being constructed between Sydenham and Chatswood, for access to the city. The stations at St Peters, Erskineville and the Bankstown to Liverpool / Lidcombe sections of the line will not be served by the metro; service patterns for these sections have not been announced.
Description of line
Beginning at Town Hall station on the City Circle, most services operate around the City Circle in a clockwise direction to Central, then through Redfern. However both inbound and outbound trains can also travel in the counterwise direction around the City Circle, as of the November 2017 timetable. Thereafter, trains usually operate on the 'Illawarra local' (western pair) tracks between Redfern and Sydenham, serving St Peters and Erskineville stations. The Bankstown railway line begins at Sydenham station on the Illawarra line. The line branches at Sydenham Junction and passes in a westwards direction to Bankstown, where it heads north to Birrong. Between Marrickville and Campsie, the Metropolitan Goods line runs in parallel. At Sefton Park Junction (west of Birrong), the line meets the Main South Line which runs from Lidcombe to Cabramatta via Regents Park. At the junction, about half of the Bankstown Line trains continue north to Lidcombe. The other half goes west to Liverpool.
| Name | Distance from Central |
Opened |
Railway line | Sydney Trains interchanges | Other interchanges* | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Town Hall | 1.2 km | 1932 | City Circle | none | ||
| Wynyard | 2.1 km | 1932 | ||||
| Circular Quay | 3.0 km | 1956 | ||||
| St James | 4.3km
(via Town Hall) |
1926 | ||||
| Museum | 5km
(via Town Hall) |
1926 | ||||
| Central | 0 km | 1855 |
| |||
| Redfern | 1.3 km | 1878 | Illawarra | (T8 peak hours only) |
none | |
| Erskineville | 2.9 km | 1884 | none | |||
| St Peters | 3.8 km | 1884 | (T8 peak hours only) | |||
| Sydenham | 5.3 km | 1884 | (T8 peak hours only) | |||
| Marrickville | 6.6 km | 1895 | Bankstown | none | ||
| Dulwich Hill | 7.9 km | 1895 | ||||
| Hurlstone Park | 8.8 km | 1895 | none | |||
| Canterbury | 10.2 km | 1895 | ||||
| Campsie | 11.7 km | 1895 | ||||
| Belmore | 13.3 km | 1895 | ||||
| Lakemba | 14.5 km | 1909 | ||||
| Wiley Park | 15.4 km | 1938 | ||||
| Punchbowl | 16.5 km | 1909 | ||||
| Bankstown | 18.7 km | 1909 | ||||
| Yagoona | 20.6 km | 1928 | ||||
| Birrong | 22.1 km | 1928 | ||||
| At Birrong, the line branches. The Northern branch is towards Lidcombe, and the western branch is towards Liverpool. | ||||||
| To Lidcombe | ||||||
| Regents Park | 19.9 km | 1912 | Main South | none | none | |
| Berala | 18.4 km | 1912 | ||||
| Lidcombe | 16.6 km | 1858 | ||||
| To Liverpool | ||||||
| Sefton | 21.2 km | 1924 | Main South | none | none | |
| Chester Hill | 22.3 km | 1924 | ||||
| Leightonfield | 23.7 km | 1942 | ||||
| Villawood | 24.5 km | 1924 | ||||
| Carramar | 25.9 km | 1924 | ||||
| Cabramatta | 28.4 km | 1870 | ||||
| Warwick Farm | 34.2 km | 1889 | ||||
| Liverpool | 35.7 km | 1856 | ||||
- Most stations are served by connecting bus services. Some additional stations may be served by intercity trains at certain times.
Patronage
The following table shows the patronage of Sydney Trains network for the year ending 30 June 2019.
| Line | Figure |
|---|---|
| † T1 |
106,924,000 |
T2 |
58,917,000 |
T3 |
30,578,000 |
T4 |
69,575,000 |
T5 |
7,738,000 |
T6 |
568,000 |
T7 |
1,802,000 |
T8 |
46,346,000 |
| † | 34,036,000 |
- ↑ Figures based on Opal tap on and tap off data.
†= T1 North Shore, Northern & Western Line was split into the T1 North Shore & Western Line and T9 Northern Line in April 2019. These figures group the T1 Northern Line with those of the T9 Northern Line instead of the T1. Additionally, the Northern Line route was changed in Septermber 2018 when the Epping to Chatswood line was closed. This resulted in a decrease in Northern Line and an increase in North Shore Line patronage from October.
References
- ↑ "NSW Railway Passenger Services 1880-1905.". Australian Railway History, April 2005. Australian Railway Historical Society NSW Division.
- ↑ Brady, I. Sydney Electric Trains From 1926 to 1960. Australian Railway Historical Society Bulletin, Vol 52, no 762. April 2001.
- ↑ NSWrail map 1992
- ↑ Sydney Suburban Network map, 2000
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 "NSW Rail.net Bankstown line". http://www.nswrail.net/lines/show.php?name=NSW:bankstown. Retrieved 1 July 2007.
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 "NSW Rail.net South Coast line". http://www.nswrail.net/lines/show.php?name=NSW:south_coast. Retrieved 1 July 2007.
- ↑ 7.0 7.1 "NSW Rail.net City Circle". http://www.nswrail.net/lines/show.php?name=NSW:city_circle. Retrieved 1 July 2007.
- ↑ 8.0 8.1 "NSW Rail.net Lidcombe-Cabramatta line". http://www.nswrail.net/lines/show.php?name=NSW:lidcombe_cabramatta. Retrieved 1 July 2007.
- ↑ "Driver Route Knowledge Diagrams - City Circle". https://railsafe.org.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0010/32977/City-Circle-Central-to-Central-via-Circular-Quay-Book.PDF. Retrieved 2 Jan 2019.
- ↑ "Train Patronage - Monthly Figures". Transport for NSW. https://www.transport.nsw.gov.au/data-and-research/passenger-travel/train-patronage/train-patronage-monthly-figures. Retrieved 23 August 2019.
Attribution
This article incorporates text from the following revision of the English Wikipedia article "Bankstown Line": https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bankstown_Line&oldid=889663081.