Major train headache rocks Mardi Gras

Residents have been left fuming following a sudden announcement that a major metro line will close most weekends for the next two months, the first beginning on night of the city’s annual Mardi Gras parade.

The Metro North West Line, which travels between Tallawong and Chatswood, will be closed six out of eight weekends in March and April, beginning on Saturday.

Trackwork will also be taking place on the T4, T7 and South Coast lines this weekend, with many frustrated locals forced to use bus replacements from Saturday to Sunday.

A number of impacted customers took to social media to complain about the inconvenience on one of the busiest nights of the year when thousands descend on the CBD to watch the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras parade.

“Mardi Gras night. Unbelievable. Great forward planning. Do you have enough bus drivers this time?,” one person wrote in reply to a Sydney Metro post on X.

“t4 closed again f*** me we have had constant close-downs and again,” another frustrated customer said.

“seems like the T4 is being closed every weekend, how about you just close it for a week and spend some quality time fixing it instead of this rubbish,” a third wrote.

Passengers are being warned to allow extra travel time to get to their destination this weekend.

Sydney Metro thanked the community for their patience ahead of what is expected to be a frustrating couple of months.

“Sydney Metro will be conducting testing over the next two months to make sure its trains and control systems are able to transition seamlessly between the existing Metro North West Line and the new city section of Metro before it opens this year,” a statement released on Friday said.

Once the extended line opens, commuters will be able to catch a metro service every four minutes between Sydney’s northwest and CBD. Sydney Metro claims it will move more people across the Harbour in the busiest hour of the peak than the Sydney Harbour Bridge and Sydney Harbour Tunnel combined.

Buses will replace metro services on the following weekends from 2am Saturday to 2am Monday:

• Saturday 2 March – Sunday 3 March

• Saturday 9 March – Sunday 10 March

• Saturday 16 March – Sunday 17 March

• Saturday 23 March – Sunday 24 March

• Saturday 6 April – Sunday 7 April

• Saturday 13 April – Sunday 14 April.

Buses will also replace nightly metro services on the following weeknights from 8.40pm to 2am:

• Tuesday 5 March and Wednesday 6 March

• Tuesday 12 March and Wednesday 13 March

• Tuesday 2 April, Wednesday 3 April and Thursday 4 April

• Tuesday 16 April, Wednesday 17 April and Thursday 18 April.

Travellers can plan ahead for their trip by visiting transportnsw.info or using trip planning apps.