What amazes me is that almost a quarter of a century after East Hills-Glenfield and well over a decade after the Y-Link we still have Campbelltown via Granville trains.

I'm no expert in this area but if the C'town via Granville train disappeared, would the trains have to turnback at Liverpool instead? This is in addition to the Glenfield (soon Leppington?) via Granville.

I'm no expert in this area but if the C'town via Granville train disappeared, would the trains have to turnback at Liverpool instead? This is in addition to the Glenfield (soon Leppington?) via Granville.

You could also do it at Glenfield, at least for some.

During weekday off-peak, North Shore Line services are interlined with Epping services while Macquarie Park services are interlined with Western Line services. A direct consequence is more A-sets via Gordon and more old trains via Macquarie Park.

Does that not mean that they would run the A sets via Macquarie Park to the Western line and the older sets from North Strathfield to the upper North Shore via Gordon?  

From the draft timetable, the A sets will get a similar share on either route.
ie. Hornsby via Macquarie Park and Epping via Strathfield will see a reduction in A-set proportion. Hornsby via Gordon and Western Line will see an increase in A-set proportion.

On the East Hills and Airport line, I have noticed that there aren't any Macarthur via Sydenham services outside of peak hour but they compensate with numerous services via the Airport that are express from Holsworthy to Wolli Creek.

I was quite surprised by the proposed off-peak services.
There are 4tph Revesby, 2tph Macarthur, 1tph Campbelltown and 1tph Kingsgrove.

Even without K2RQ, I think 4tph Revesby, 4tph Macarthur would be achievable easily.

It seems that few people talk about the situation of Homebush here.

Homebush will not get any westbound train (except late night).
In other words, passengers travelling from Homebush to the west (Flemington, Lidcombe, Auburn and all stations beyond) must backtrack to Strathfield and change train.
Cityrail may need to introduce a new clause to allow such travel pattern.

I was quite surprised by the proposed off-peak services.
There are 4tph Revesby, 3tph Macarthur and 1tph Kingsgrove.

Even without K2RQ, I think 4tph Revesby, 4tph Macarthur would be achievable easily.

You sure about those numbers?  The only addition from present is the Kingsgrove trains (2tph), which give a 6/9 minute frequency on the Airport line weekdays.  It's an advance, but I'm not sure what is so difficult about extending those trains to Campbelltown.

What about the new Wolli Creek freight bypass?

Now that absolutely every train will stop at Wolli Ck there will be no passenger trains at all on the two western tracks that have no platforms. Will these tracks get used sufficiently by freight services to keep them clean, or will they end up becoming derelict until someone coughs up enough money to put some extra platforms in?

What about the new Wolli Creek freight bypass?

Now that absolutely every train will stop at Wolli Ck there will be no passenger trains at all on the two western tracks that have no platforms. Will these tracks get used sufficiently by freight services to keep them clean, or will they end up becoming derelict until someone coughs up enough money to put some extra platforms in?

Daily Freight Services should be enough to keep the Lines in use, and they may table Empty trains over that particular section as well.

They will keep these tracks in use, just in case of emergency or for diversions when the Main Illawarra Lines are closed.
On the odd occasion, when the Bankstown Lines are closed from Sydenham to Bankstown, Bankstown Line trains are diverted to run to/from Hurstville utilising the Illawarra Local Lines.

- Scott.

They will keep these tracks in use, just in case of emergency or for diversions when the Main Illawarra Lines are closed.
On the odd occasion, when the Bankstown Lines are closed from Sydenham to Bankstown, Bankstown Line trains are diverted to run to/from Hurstville utilising the Illawarra Local Lines.

- Scott.

One thing I noticed in the proposed timetable that the Bankstown line has become out and back clockwise thru the city circle instead of being integrated with the inner west line. (And anti clockwise )
On the occasions mentioned by Scott above, looks like the inner west lines will not need be going to Hurstville.

One thing I noticed in the proposed timetable that the Bankstown line has become out and back clockwise thru the city circle instead of being integrated with the inner west line. (And anti clockwise )
On the occasions mentioned by Scott above, looks like the inner west lines will not need be going to Hurstville.

Bankstown services effectively "self-feeding" aren't exactly new, though. Several morning peak semi-fast services from Liverpool run in via Town Hall and out via Museum as Liverpool via Bankstown trains again.

Bankstown services effectively "self-feeding" aren't exactly new, though. Several morning peak semi-fast services from Liverpool run in via Town Hall and out via Museum as Liverpool via Bankstown trains again.

What is new is that it looks like they have all become "self-feeding"

Speaking of the City Circle, here's my observation of how it functions in the off-peak:

Currently there are 6 Airport Line and 4 Bankstown Line trains per hour that feed into the City Circle (Inner) via Museum. 4 of these go to the Macdonaldtown stabling, 4 into the Inner West Line, and 2 into the South Line. The City Circle (Outer) is the reverse. This results in 10TPH in each direction, or a train every 6 minutes on average. However, poor spacing between trains means headways of up to 12 minutes on the City Circle in the middle of the day. Compare this to the Eastern Suburbs Line, which has 6TPH evenly spaced out, thus a train every 10 minutes. A much better design for encouraging spontaneous trips within the city.

The draft timetable adds 2 more Airport Line trains, but also moves the 4 Bankstown Line trains to the City Circle (Outer)via Town Hall and has them feed back into the Bankstown Line from Museum. The Airport Line trains then feed into the Inner West Line (4), South Line (2), and Macdonaldtown Stabling (2). Again, the City Circle (Outer) is the reverse, only also with the Bankstown Line trains as well this time. This results in 12TPH clockwise (via Town Hall) and 8TPH anti-clockwise (via Museum). Average headways are now 5/7.5 minutes, but this time the spacings are more even. This gives maximum headways of 6 minutes in the clockwise direction and 9 minutes in the anti-clockwise direction.

This should make the City Circle a more attractive choice for any spontaneous trips within the CBD during the off-peak.

But as I stated before, does anyone know what the "e" after Strathfield &/or Redfern for the Newcastle to Sydney trains means?

Newcastle Express - 'e' = early

Thanks, but do you know what is meant "early" in this instance, as I can't see if a train is due at a certain time, that it would have an early after the time?

Thanks, but do you know what is meant "early" in this instance, as I can't see if a train is due at a certain time, that it would have an early after the time?

The train may depart earlier then its timetabled time.

You sure about those numbers?  The only addition from present is the Kingsgrove trains (2tph), which give a 6/9 minute frequency on the Airport line weekdays.  It's an advance, but I'm not sure what is so difficult about extending those trains to Campbelltown.

The addition is 1tph Kingsgrove and 1tph Campbelltown (separated by 1/2 hour from each other).


The new sector 2 off-peak service patterns are:
Homebush -> City Outer -> Kingsgrove/Campbelltown/Macarthur (total 4tph)
Kingsgrove/Campbelltown/Macarthur -> City Inner -> Homebush (total 4tph)


Glenfield/Macdonaldtown turnback -> City Outer -> Revesby (total 4tph)
Revesby -> City Inner -> Glenfield/Macdonaldtown turnback (total 4tph)


Lidcombe (via Bankstown) -> City Outer -> Liverpool (via Bankstown) (total 2tph)
Liverpool (via Bankstown) -> City Outer -> Lidcombe (via Bankstown) (total 2tph)


Total via City Inner: 8tph
Total via City Outer: 12tph

SMH Article on the new timetable, quite critical of where it falls short of election promises (plus complaints from Kogarah).

Transport Minister Gladys Berejiklian said on Monday the timetable was a draft version with ''plenty of work to do'' before it was finalised.

SMH Article on the new timetable, quite critical of where it falls short of election promises (plus complaints from Kogarah).

SMH article:

"The draft timetable has prompted concern among some experts and Campbelltown commuters that the government will not take advantage of expensive new infrastructure on the East Hills line.

The new timetable shows ''express'' trains from Campbelltown and Macarthur will be running to the city via the airport line, which is significantly slower than the alternative route via Sydenham.

Instead, ''slow trains'' that stop at more stations between Campbelltown and Revesby will run to the city via the faster Sydenham route.

The result is that the draft timetable includes no obvious express services from Campbelltown to the city."

Well actually if the journo did any research, he'd find that the 2 routes take almost/exactly the same time to get to Central, its only the stopping pattern that makes it faster. If he checked the current off-peak Cambo, all to Riverwood, Kingsgrove, Sydenham, Redfern, Central, City trains, they have the exact same journey time as the Macarthur via Airport trains. If you ask me, there are a lot more express services now, the Cambo, all to Revesby, Sydenham, Redfern, Central is express and the Cambo, all to Holsworthy, Wolli Creek, all to Central via Airport is also express to me. Of course there is the disclaimer of the word "obvious" so the journo can claim he didn't actually think they were express (whether he is lying to make the article more interesting could also be debated). Whether or not 135 express services are being introduced, that may or may not be true, I'll let others judge that but as far as the South-West goes, Gladys has done a good job.

Glad to see Bankstown Line becomes self-feeding for most of the time, and congra to Marrickville's residents who receive a huge boost of train service during peak hours. Also I'm pleased to see the government extends the frequent hour of trains to around 10pm both weekdays and weekend, and shift the pm peak to 5 to 7, which is more reasonable. Good job.

For the Bankstown Line, I observe that the only loser is Yagoona and Wiley Park, which experience a decreased level of service during two peaks. And for residents of Canterbury, Hurlstone Park, Dulwich Hill and Erskineville, merely no advance of their local train services. I agree that stations with a higher demand should receive more train services, but what I'm thinking is converting 1 (or 2 in the coming future) of the 4 limited stops services into a all stopper would help them to get on board a city-bound train easier. During peak hours, these stations also need some extra capacity to transport their local resident into the city.

All my wishes are, hoping this timetable works and all trains running on time. Otherwise, this could be a bigger mass.

It makes much more sense running East Hills Line services via Airport in the off-peak. The services in the proposed timetable that go Wolli Creek then Holsworthy already miss Riverwood - East Hills from the more common stopping pattern, so their loads shouldn't be high. By making additional stops via the Airport Line, those services can be much more useful for airport commuters. There's a few other reasons why it makes sense to travel via Airport rather than Sydenham.

1. Makes interchanging much more simpler for people on the Illawarra Line, by interchanging at Wolli Creek. No need to figure out whether to go to Sydenham or Wolli Creek to interchange.
2. Now that the Airport Line sees 8 trains per hour around the clock, this hopefully will encourage more people to catch a train to the airport with such regular services. Running the expresses via the Airport helps contribute to those services.
3. Avoids conflict with the Bankstown Line at Sydenham, making it easier to schedule and reducing the impact of any delays on one part of the line.

As far as the Bankstown Line goes, I think there's been some hits and some misses. As lyyjjimmy says, the frequent hour has been extended and there are more services overall. I think a lot of commuters will also appreciate the "via Town Hall" destination of trains now as well.

But I think the revised limited stops services, which have become much more numerous, are a severe miss.

I don't see why Yagoona and Wiley Park should no longer have the limited stops services.

For one, the current limited stops services seem to get most of their customers in the Bankstown to Campsie segment. Hardly anyone actually uses the services to get to/from Liverpool as the South Line is still faster. Skipping Yagoona provides no time saving to those passengers boarding further towards the City and likewise to a lesser extent for Wiley Park. The people from those stations, even though they aren't as much in number as the other stations, will still have to face a 30 minute+ journey on the all stops services now.

Furthermore, considering that Yagoona and Wiley Park are much further from the City than say Marrickville or St Peters, I don't see why those two stations were substituted out for Marrickville and St Peters. Marrickville and St Peters already have it pretty good considering how close they live to the City, especially St Peters. Both stations are within 15 minutes of Central. Adding those stops so late in the journey also costs the already-full train of passengers additional journey time, which is something that would not have occurred as much with the additional stops at Yagoona and Wiley Park, since there would have been numerous passengers boarding after those stops at Bankstown, Punchbowl, Lakemba, Belmore and Campsie.

Furthermore, the people who board at Marrickville and St Peters get hardly any benefit from catching these limited stops services at all. The people at St Peters and Marrickville only have one station skipped (Erskineville) from the normal service, providing them with a 1 minute gain at best.

I think that the current limited stops services have a much better stopping pattern - all to Campsie, Sydenham, Redfern, City and back. It makes much more logical sense in that those who live further should get the faster service, not people at Marrickville or St Peters who not only have a much shorter journey to make, but also hardly get any benefit from the limited stops service, and also slow down the journey time for the commuters further away from the City.

As another note, it seems Warwick Farm has been re-added to the Bankstown Line for regular services. That was a very strange anomaly of the current timetable.

For those more experienced in reading these timetables, is there any indication that at Glenfield that they'll be using the new infrastructure at Glenfield from the SWRL - Northern flyover, P4 and run-around tracks, maybe the southern flyover as a turnback from P3/4 to P1/2?

As far as the Bankstown Line goes, I think there's been some hits and some misses. As lyyjjimmy says, the frequent hour has been extended and there are more services overall. I think a lot of commuters will also appreciate the "via Town Hall" destination of trains now as well.

But I think the revised limited stops services, which have become much more numerous, are a severe miss.

I don't see why Yagoona and Wiley Park should no longer have the limited stops services.

For one, the current limited stops services seem to get most of their customers in the Bankstown to Campsie segment. Hardly anyone actually uses the services to get to/from Liverpool as the South Line is still faster. Skipping Yagoona provides no time saving to those passengers boarding further towards the City and likewise to a lesser extent for Wiley Park. The people from those stations, even though they aren't as much in number as the other stations, will still have to face a 30 minute+ journey on the all stops services now.

Furthermore, considering that Yagoona and Wiley Park are much further from the City than say Marrickville or St Peters, I don't see why those two stations were substituted out for Marrickville and St Peters. Marrickville and St Peters already have it pretty good considering how close they live to the City, especially St Peters. Both stations are within 15 minutes of Central. Adding those stops so late in the journey also costs the already-full train of passengers additional journey time, which is something that would not have occurred as much with the additional stops at Yagoona and Wiley Park, since there would have been numerous passengers boarding after those stops at Bankstown, Punchbowl, Lakemba, Belmore and Campsie.

Furthermore, the people who board at Marrickville and St Peters get hardly any benefit from catching these limited stops services at all. The people at St Peters and Marrickville only have one station skipped (Erskineville) from the normal service, providing them with a 1 minute gain at best.

I think that the current limited stops services have a much better stopping pattern - all to Campsie, Sydenham, Redfern, City and back. It makes much more logical sense in that those who live further should get the faster service, not people at Marrickville or St Peters who not only have a much shorter journey to make, but also hardly get any benefit from the limited stops service, and also slow down the journey time for the commuters further away from the City.

As another note, it seems Warwick Farm has been re-added to the Bankstown Line for regular services. That was a very strange anomaly of the current timetable.

Personally, I agree with clrks. For residents from Yagoona and Wiley Park, train is the *only* way to get them to the city center. Eliminating these two stations out of the limited stopping list is a drawback to them. At the mean time, passengers from Marrickville do suffer hard time when they are trying to board a fully-packed 15-minute-interval all stops service currently during peak times, and they are definitely deserve a better train service, especially after the station makeup finished next year.

Before the timetable leaks, my design of the Bankstown Line patterns have three common patterns during peak hours:
1) Central, Redfern, all to Campsie, Bankstown, then all to Lidcombe (4tph)
2) Central, Redfern, Sydenham, Campsie, all to Bankstown, then all to Liverpool (4tph)
3) Central all to Bankstown (utilising the storage at the western side of the station, 2tph)

This pattern should ensure most stations before Birrong receives 6tph, the same for stations between Bankstown and Campsie, but more between Campsie and Sydenham, including Marrickville, and 4tph beyond Birrong on each route.  

The reason I terminating some trains at Bankstown is to increase the overall efficiency of Bankstown Line by reducing the need to run the train all the way to further destination and that shuttle could straight back to city and provide extra capacity to passengers between Bankstown and Sydenham, the most demanding section of the line, while keeping the terminating train clean to the lines.

To test whether this arrangement is possible, I produce a (really) draft timetable and operation chart. It only shows a peak period between 7am to 9am, from Bankstown. Further, I would assume that the signal would allow a 2 minutes tracing interval at some points.

A problem of this arrangement is that for stations between Bankstown and Campsie, trains does not spread evenly and the all stoppers are just 2 minutes away from the limited stops. So I abandoned this idea really soon LOL

Graph needs more dwell.

I think that with the additional limited stops services, the all stops services will now be a bit more lightly loaded for the Bankstown Line. I found another interesting tidbit in the draft timetable - it seems the Bankstown Line goes via Museum on weekends and on to Homebush, in contrast to the new via Town Hall norm on weekdays.

I'm guessing it makes things a little more simpler doing it like that on the weekend.

With the split of trains from Liverpool via Bankstown and via Granville, there is currently 3 minutes slower to travel to Central via Bankstown, and the via Bankstown services are 3 minutes behind the via Granville services. This means that for Liverpool, Warwick Farm and Cabramatta it is now always quickest to get on the next available service to the city as they are all via Town Hall, and the via Bankstown service will still get you to your destination 9 minutes before waiting for the following train.

This is the opposite situation to now when the via Bankstown service is 3 minutes before the via Granville, meaning that if you let the service go and get the later train you arrive to the city earlier.

This was needed with the withdrawal of the Liverpool to City via Regents Park services to make sure that the via Granville services don't get overcrowded.

You can be assured that this has all gone through massive amounts of load modeling to get it right.

Give me a single good reason why there should be Bankstown terminators in the timetable.  Two branches is enough to serve given the limited paths through the city available.  They shouldn't use them up on short workings.