Gladys Berejiklian med rel: Sixth new rail maintenance facility to open in Western Sydney as maintenance funding increases

Minister for Transport Gladys Berejiklian today said a sixth brand new rail maintenance Centre of Excellence will be opened in Western Sydney, to further improve the mess left behind by Labor and modernise outdated maintenance practices.

Ms Berejiklian said the NSW Government continues to invest in improvements right across the rail network, to deliver for customers.

“I’m very pleased our $60 million project to build eight new maintenance Centres of Excellence and four smaller satellite facilities is on track, with our sixth facility opening in Clyde in July,” Ms Berejiklian said.

The NSW Government’s total rail maintenance funding will increase to $1.12 billion in 2014-15, up from $1.105 billion in 2013-14. This includes capital maintenance expenditure on projects making a significant difference which will rise to $278.3 million in 2014-15, up from $246.8 million in 2013-14.

“The NSW Government committed as part of its Fixing the Trains reforms to overhaul Sydney Trains maintenance and that is what we are doing,” Ms Berejiklian said.

“We have now reached another major milestone, with 75 per cent of around 130 disjointed maintenance depots now spread into six brand new Centres of Excellence across the train network,” Ms Berejiklian said.

The sixth base at Clyde coming online in July comes after five other bases already opened at Blacktown, Sydenham, Glenfield, Wollongong and Gosford. Work is now underway to complete the other facilities at Lawson, Hornsby, the CBD and Granville.

“The former depots were a legacy of years of disorganised maintenance strategy, that were using outdated and inefficient maintenance practices,” Ms Berejiklian said.

Since beginning operations in July 2013, Sydney Trains has delivered other significant improvements in maintenance, including making trackwork more efficient.

“We are seeing the results and this has helped Sydney Trains exceed on-time running, reliability and punctuality targets in ten out of its first 11 months of operation.”