Metro Tunnel was meant to open on Sunday, but train services are months away

The first passengers were hoped to be travelling on the $15 billion Metro Tunnel rail lines by this Sunday, but the state government has admitted it is yet to complete a train timetable.

On Saturday, The Age revealed a partial service would operate on the nine-kilometre underground tunnel in November, but peak-hour trains would not run until next year.

Two stations – Town Hall and State Library – are yet to be completed.

Premier Jacinta Allan promised trains would be running in 2025, and in June last year, The Age reported builders were offered $143.5 million extra if they achieved “Day One Train Operations” – the first day passengers could use the tunnel – by Sunday, June 29, 2025.

The offer was part of “additional payments” offered to the tunnel’s Cross Yarra partnership construction consortium worth up to $888 million to ensure the tunnel opened in 2025.

The tunnel will augment the City Loop and relieve congestion on train travel through the city. Sunbury and Dandenong trains, which currently go through the City Loop, will be diverted to the Metro Tunnel, stopping at five stations – Anzac (opposite the Shrine of Remembrance), Town Hall, State Library, Parkville and Arden (in North Melbourne).

Labor frontbencher Steve Dimopoulos initially said on Saturday The Age’s report was wrong, before saying it was pre-emptive to say whether trains would run through the tunnel at peak times by the end of the year.

He said the project was actually “a year early”, as then-premier Daniel Andrews announced in 2015 that it would be completed at the end of 2026.

The project has had numerous proposed opening dates since its conception 10 years ago. A freedom of information request by The Age in October 2023 revealed the project’s target for “day one train operations” was September 17, 2024. However, it had also built in a contingency of up to 12 months to allow for unexpected delays during testing of new technology, some of which has never before been used in Victoria.

The Allan government has made a firm commitment to open the rail tunnel this year, with posters plastered at train stations promising it will carry passengers in 2025.

“This is a transformational project,” Dimopoulos said on Saturday. “This is iconic. We’ve not seen something like this for 40 years in the city. We’re going to decongest the City Loop. There will be precincts in Victoria and Melbourne that have never had access to a train line,” he said.

“The timetabling of what that will look like is being worked on now by the minister and her team, and we’ll reveal that information later this year.”

On whether builders would still receive their incentives if they didn’t meet their targets, Dimopoulos said arrangements with big operators and builders were “commercial-in-confidence for good reason”.

He said he didn’t think commuters would be upset by the delay.

“I don’t think people are going to be anything but overjoyed when they walk through those five stations.

“This is a huge project, that’s what I think people will be embracing.”

Opposition Leader Brad Battin said the Metro Tunnel project was another example of the Allan government facing “cost blowouts and major issues” with its key infrastructure projects.

“How could a government spend billions of dollars and not have the plan ready and know exactly what time those [Metro Tunnel] stations are going to open and how often trains can operate?” he said.

During a press conference at the Beaconsfield train station on Saturday, Battin said opening up the Metro Tunnel without providing trains during peak times would be a “broken promise” from Premier Jacinta Allan.

The opposition leader said contracts needed to be tightened for infrastructure projects in Victoria, as the government was taking “too much risk” when projects slowed down.

Public Transport Users Association member Daniel Bowen said it was not unprecedented to open large rail infrastructure in stages.

He said if the Metro Tunnel opened in this way, clear communication was needed to tell users which trains would run through the Metro Tunnel and which would run on existing lines.

“People are looking forward to the Metro Tunnel being open, but it is important that they get it right,” he said.

“You’d hate for them to rush things and then have big problems with the service, or the reliability, or the stations once people are using it.”

Lord Mayor of Melbourne Nick Reece said some things were worth the wait and the Melbourne Metro Tunnel certainly fits that category. “It’s going to be a transformational project for Melbourne and our transport system for the central city,” he said.

With Patrick Hatch

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