Passengers are outraged after the long-awaited $7billion driverless Metro train experienced massive delays just hours after opening.
NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian appeared at Tallawong in Sydney’s north-west on Sunday morning to watch the first ever driverless train take off.
Despite the excitement, commuters have slammed the service online, with many saying there have been a multitude of problems.
Passengers are outraged after the long-awaited $7billion driverless Metro train experienced massive delays just hours after opening
Despite the excitement, commuters have slammed the service online, with many saying there have been a multitude of problems
Technical glitches surrounded the first services, with reports emerging that the train had driven too far forward, causing it to reverse and realign itself for the doors to open.
All Metro platforms are set up with screen doors, and the train is supposed to automatically line up with the screens to prevent accidents on the tracks.
‘Train seems to have over shot the platform doors at Macquarie Park we were delayed an extra 20 seconds until door opened. Cue the outrage,’ one user wrote on Twitter.
‘Had a train at Tallawong miss the alignment by a small amount. Doors wouldn’t open until they reversed the train by probably 0.5m. But it took 3-4 minutes to do so,’ one Reddit user said.
‘Don’t see how they will be able to maintain a train every 4 mins if every couple of trains have to spend 3 mins reversing.’
One person took to Twitter to post a worrying image of a missing screw spotted on the floor on one of the platforms.
‘@SydneyMetro Is this screw important?’ they asked with a worried emoji.
There were also reports of the doors failing to open at one stop, with some missing their stop because of the glitch
Technical glitches surrounded the first services, with reports emerging that the train had driven too far forward, causing it to reverse and realign itself for the doors to open (pictured)
Multiple people reported that services were stuck between stations for periods of up to 15 minutes.
‘Metro to Chatswood has been stuck at Macquarie Park for almost 15 minutes now,’ one user wrote on Reddit.
Others reported that there had been major delays on the service, with some complaining they’d been waiting on the platform for more than half an hour.
There were also reports of the doors failing to open at one stop, with some missing their station because of the glitch.
‘The door closing AND next stop announcements were faulty on both trains I was on today. The displays in the train were also glitchy,’ one user complained.
About 1.30pm on Sunday, Sydney Metro announced a 15 to 20 minute service gap because of the problem with the doors
One person took to Twitter to post a worrying image of a missing screw spotted on the floor on one of the platforms
Another person took to Reddit to post images on board one of the Metro services, saying the door was currently out of service.
Not only were commuters waiting longer than expected for their trains, images of massive crowds were also shared online.
There have also been complaints over the trains not running past 10pm, with one user saying on Twitter: ‘How is this the future? It’s driverless, you clods. Like how could you have a public transport system that closes before midnight?!?’
About 1.30pm on Sunday, Sydney Metro announced a 15 to 20 minute service gap because of the problem with the doors.
People have complained of waiting up to half an hour on the platform after the Sydney Metro services were delayed
Others have taken to Twitter to complain about the services only running between 5am and 10pm
More than 20,000 people have worked on the $7.3 billion northwest project and work is now underway to extend the line from Chatswood to Bankstown.
When the northwest line reaches full operation, trains will run every four minutes each way during peak hour between Tallawong and Chatswood.
But they will run once every five minutes at peak for about six weeks, which Mr Constance previously described as a ‘ramp up period’.
He said on Sunday that life was about to change ‘for so many people who work hard every day’ and he was ‘looking forward to tomorrow with the first commute in the morning peak’.
The fully-automated trains are required to operate with a 98 per cent on time running reliability, according to a government fact sheet.
A spokesperson for NSW trains said 75,000 people caught the service in the first five hours.
‘At 1.04pm a Metro train stopped at Macquarie Park due to an issue with a door not aligning correctly,’ he said.
‘Passengers alighted and were collected by another train.’
‘The train has been taken to Chatswood and engineers are currently investigating.’
Not only were commuters waiting longer than expected for their trains, images of massive crowds have also been shared online