Sydney Trains is to get a record $2.1 billion to spend on maintenance so it can improve service reliability and incident response.
The funding is contained in the forthcoming 2026-27 NSW Budget’s rail reliability plan; the plan will spend $200 million more on maintenance, $150m (over four years) to improve the Rail Operations Centre and put more train drivers and guards on Intercity services between Sydney, Illawarra, Central Coast, Newcastle and Blue Mountains.
The NSW Government says the extra spending is the result of findings by an Independent Rail Review of overhead wire failures at Homebush in May 2025 that caused two days of chaos.
Transport Minister John Graham says the Sydney Trains network of 14 lines, 288 stations and more than 1790 kilometres of track remains the backbone of the rail system.
“The 12 recommendations of the Review remain the blueprint for how we prioritise maintenance, deploy new technology and raise standards around customer care during disruption or communicate to passengers on stations,” he says.
GREATER RESILIENCE FOR SYDNEY TRAINS
Regional Transport Minister Jenny Aitchison says the spending will allow them to deliver what passengers want: a rail system able to meet the demands of a growing population.
“It will help strengthen the foundations of the entire network, from critical upgrades to better incident response and crucial passenger support,” she points out.
“Any issues on the metropolitan rail network can have flow-on impacts to reliability and travel times for regional services.
“Better maintenance on key intercity routes means
better outcomes for regional passengers across NSW.”
She says the spending is in addition to $100m in joint funding earmarked for upgrades to the Sydney-Canberra rail corridor.
Transport Secretary Josh Murray calls the new funding “a significant step forward” in strengthening the rail network.
“We know reliability depends on more than just recent investments to fleet and infrastructure; it depends on a well-resourced, well-coordinated workforce,” he says.
“This funding enables a more integrated approach to operations (from workforce planning to real-time service delivery) reducing risk and improving performance.”
The result, he says, should be more consistent services and a more resilient rail network.
Sydney Trains chief executive Matt Longland says: “This investment strengthens reliability end-to-end — from upgrading critical infrastructure to improving incident response, crewing and passenger support.”
He says the operations centre’s decision-making will improve as will its response capability such as a new passenger care and support team to deploy during major disruptions.
The team will support affected passengers onboard trains, at stations and at key interchanges with face-to-face communication, delivering basic welfare support like water during delays, assist vulnerable passengers and help people find other transport options.
The Review’s findings called for better targeted infrastructure maintenance in “critical zones” like the Homebush-Strathfield corridor.
The government pointed to its previous responses which include:
- an extra $425m over four years to upgrade track, signals, overhead wiring and drainage in flood-prone areas.
- $35m to fast-track repairs in high-priority areas where infrastructure failures are felt on the most passengers across multiple lines.
