Victoria’s Metro Tunnel project remains on track to open one year ahead of schedule following the latest series of trials that saw trains travel 35,000 kilometres and completing more than 2,600 trips across 10 days.
“Our test trains have travelled further than the distance from London and back in 10 days, passing their biggest test yet before the project opens this year – one year ahead of schedule,” said Acting Premier Ben Carroll, who – along with Acting Minister for Transport Infrastructure Melissa Horne – was at Anzac Station last week to congratulate all those involved with the project.
The 10-day “dress rehearsal” was an opportunity for staff and crew to become familiar with how the network operates and to test the system’s technology, said Horne. “We’re powering ahead, training staff and testing advanced technology that has never been used on our rail network before.”
So far, around 200 drivers have been trained to operate the high-capacity, high-frequency metro trains.
Trial operations will continue throughout the year as the team conducts more than 100 exercises which include manual opening and closing of the platform screen doors in the event of a system failure, and the mass evacuation of stations and trains.
The state’s biggest rail infrastructure project since the City Loop opened in 1981, the Metro Tunnel has seen the construction of twin 9km tunnels underneath the city’s CBD and the building of five new underground stations.
The Metro Tunnel – which links the rail network to Parkville and St Kilda Road for the first time – connects to the wider metro rail network with interchanges between Flinders Street Station and the new Town Hall Station.
Below, Shannon Rollinson explains the trial operations phase of the Metro Tunnel project.
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