Commuters in Western Sydney were stuck for over an hour on Monday night as urgent track repairs brought trains running from Parramatta to Blacktown to a complete halt.
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The delays were due to urgent track repairs at Westmead, one of five smaller stations in-between the two transport hubs. A spokesperson for Sydney Trains said that response teams had fixed a track failure which was affecting signals at the station.
Allow extra travel time #WesternLine from the city due to urgent track equipment repairs at Westmead.— T1 Sydney Trains (@T1SydneyTrains) April 4, 2016
A spokesperson for the Transport Management Centre said that the stoppages started at around 5:10pm and although services were sporadically starting up again by 6:30pm, "they have to go really slowly through that Westmead area, so there's a bank up of trains."
Despite this, some were still tweeting at 7pm that their trains had not moved.
Reached the 1hr 40min mark on the Redfern - Parramatta train. What a glorious Monday night! @T1SydneyTrains #westerline #sydneytrains— Jessica Best (@jessicaebest) April 4, 2016
@T1SydneyTrains slowly? Not moving at all! For a city as big as Sydney, public transport Is awful!— Moiz bandukwala (@MoizBanduk) April 4, 2016
Cruel and unusual punishment for commuters on the western line. Trains jammed for over an hour now.— Sarah Malik (@sarahbmalik) April 4, 2016
Trains running the opposite direction from Blacktown into the city were not affected. Despite a stream of tweets from the T1 Sydney Trains account, many commuters said they were left in the dark to what was happening.
@T1SydneyTrains Guard announcement "The truth of the matter is no one has told us what is happening" #StuckInLimbo— peterdeg (@peterdeg) April 4, 2016
@T1SydneyTrains how about you tell your staff to notify passengers on stopped train what is going on. Terrible— Ombu (@Ommbuu) April 4, 2016
A shuttle service sprung into operation between Blacktown and Richmond, and Blacktown and Penrith.
Trains backed up in a line stretching from Westmead to approx Lidcombe on the western line. Lots of happy people... #cityrail— clr Steven Issa (@steven_issa) April 4, 2016
.@T1SydneyTrains not running. Looks like I'm going to have to walk Granville to Toongabbie. Oh well, I need the exercise. #RailFail— Michael Shillito (@tealfooty) April 4, 2016
