TT 219: Metro Tunnel timetables released

The new Metro Tunnel timetables were released yesterday. They can be viewed on the Transport Victoria or Metro Trains website (select a date from Feb 1). The premier's media release is here. 

What's in it for Metro tunnel lines

They were pretty much as people expected - that is a 10 min maximum wait through the Metro Tunnel core with no more than 20 minute waits at the Pakenham, Cranbourne and Sunbury ends. The actual limits of the 10 minute service from first to last train is Dandenong to West Footscray, as mapped below. The 130 hours per week of frequent service on this section will be far more than on any other line.  

The feared West Footscray turnback is (thankfully) inactive most of the day. But it comes out to play its ping-pong game at nights and on Sunday mornings. Thus Tottenham to Watergardens (including the much-hyped Sunshine Super Hub) has frequent service during the day but not at night or Sunday mornings. At these times train termini alternate between Sunbury and West Footscray (not Watergardens).

The Tottenham - Watergardens portion gets about 90 hours worth of frequent service per week. That's 40 hours less than West Footscray but about the same as the Frankston line gets now. It's a big step up from the current 30 to 40 minute maximum waits but doesn't quite give the full frequent service day and night Metro Tunnel experience. At 15 hours the weekday frequent service on this section slightly exceeds the gradually emerging 14 hour rule for span of frequent service. Weekends though is much less with 9 hours of frequent service offered (approximately 10am - 7pm).  Booting passengers off every second train arrival at West Footscray at night will become a less enjoyable part of the Metro driver and staff work there.    

Town Hall will be open and served by all Metro Tunnel trains. The Night Network will operate through the Metro Tunnel but will skip Arden, Parkville, State Library and Anzac. Tram options are available nearby but this presents a legibility issue, especially for those needing to travel before about 7:30am on Sundays. Expect calls for at least Parkville and possibly Anzac to open earlier on Sunday mornings due to significant resident and/or hospital worker populations. And there is precedent - when it opened and for many years after not all City Loop stations were open on weekends whereas now they all are (although not for Night Network). 

These blemishes aside, these are historically big service changes on a network that has had too few of them in the last decade or so. This timetable adds the first new 7 day frequent rail corridor to the network since 2014 and the first in Melbourne's west. Weekday peaks will be even more frequent at most stations. This will transform the way people use trains on a major corridor and (hopefully) start a chain of upgrades on other lines.

The 'Big Switch' may be better thought of as switching on a series of service upgrades rather than transforming everything in one go as the premier's release of 7 October 2025 (in my view ill-advisedly) raised expectations about. Minister Gabrielle Williams has made encouraging noises about future service increases on this Reddit thread (that attracted responses wanting more frequency across the network). 

What's in it for other lines 

The Werribee, Craigieburn, Upfield and Frankston line get a few extra trips with the latter returning to the City Loop. Upgrades to Werribee, Craigieburn, Upfield and Sandringham lines as funded in the 2025 state budget are not a part of these timetables but will be delivered in the middle of the year. 

The Mernda, Hurstbridge, Belgrave, Lilydale, Alamein and Glen Waverley timetables are not changing. These have some of the longest waits on the network with notable examples including Belgrave and Lilydale (30 min gaps midday on a weekday) and Mernda and Hurstbridge (40 min gaps on Sunday morning).

Unlike Perth, where every station has maximum 15 minute gaps Monday to Sunday during the day, Melbourne has an increasingly two tier rail network with some parts frequent and other parts not. Level crossing removals raised expectations of significant service uplifts but these remain unfulfilled to the extent that when the government tries to sells its other rail projects (including the Metro Tunnel) there's a chorus crying 'What about us?' . All eyes will be on the 2026 state budget for at least a Clifton Hill and Burnley group rail service upgrade package with the busy Craigieburn line also having a strong case.  

This map is a rough summary of the Metro train changes (click for better view). 

There are some V/Line service increases. The new Route 241 bus starts with its routing confirmed as being North Melbourne to Yarra Bend via Arden, Parkville and Victoria Park. Replacing 202, 401 and 403, it will run every 10 minutes weekdays and 30 minutes weekends. Many other bus and coach routes will have time changes with some to happen later in the year. 

Daniel Bowen has gone through many of the details here. Also read the comments. 

Messaging

Given community expectations (often raised by the government itself) it is understandable that early commentary from some has been that the timetables (especially on the non-Metro lines) are underwhelming. 

The government has been calling this timetable change the 'Big Switch', as if everything was going to be rosy after February 1. While it is undeniable that many timetables are changing and it is a huge workload for the department, it is also true that the impact on services for those away from lines served by the Metro Tunnel range between nil and modest.

Transport Victoria is promoting the timetables under the 'More Ways to Move' slogan with a video summarising them here.  

Wider benefits and delivery of Business Case service plan

Something I got from the above video was that the Metro Tunnel's wider network benefits are framed in terms of more reliability and less platform crowding. As opposed to freeing up space for higher frequency services on other lines, which despite this being a major rationale for the project, is mostly not happening (at least in this timetable change). 

Have we got from this timetable what was proposed in the Business Case? It depends. The Business Case relied on the substitution of trips from other modes such as driving and trams and network effect to justify the project's construction. Network effects are maximised if intersecting lines operate frequently enough to enable always good connections. If intersecting lines are not boosted or trams are left as they are then the Metro Tunnel can't realise all its expected benefits.  

Consequently the 2016 Business Case included not just frequent service on the busy central part of the Metro Tunnel's own line but also on other lines including Craigieburn, Upfield and Sandringham. It did not provide for frequent service between West Footscray and Watergardens, possibly because there would have been a wish to keep options open for Sunshine including Airport Rail and V/Line electrification to Melton and/or Wyndham Vale. The Business Case was also done a few years after the Network Development Plan. That was based on continuing metropolitan rail timetable upgrades that, apart from some modest improvements in 2021, were not of interest to a government preferring to build infrastructure first. 

Yesterday's Metro Tunnel timetable takes a different tack. The Metro Tunnel ended up being completed before any of the various airport rail, Melton or Wyndham Vale schemes that otherwise would have used train paths between Sunshine and the CBD got off the ground. Thus, unlike the NDP, the Business Case or the worries I expressed here, the Metro Tunnel timetable does included ten minute frequencies to Watergardens (for most of the day, Monday to Sunday). This is a big win on a busy section of the network. The government was right to insist on this otherwise it would have been an embarrassment.   

However other parts of the Business Case plan to expand the 10 minute frequent network aren't happening. Craigieburn and Upfield were removed from the lines slated to get a 10 minute frequency. Assisted by funding in the 2025 state budget, Sandringham will happen but not on Day 1 due to a wish to through-route to Newport whose lines are currently the subject of level crossing removal works. 

Taking all that into account means that on February 1 some 35 fewer stations will have off peak service every 10 min or better than was envisaged in the Business Case. However when Sandringham comes on stream in mid 2026 that gap will drop to 22 fewer. Click below for more details. 

Conclusion

To sum up the more frequent Metro Tunnel timetable is at least as significant as the new stations in making the Sunbury, Pakenham and Cranbourne lines much more useful.

West Footscray to Dandenong will become Melbourne's first frequent train corridor to operates every 10 minutes or better first to last train, that is about 18 hours a day including weekends. This is truly big - existing frequent corridors such as to Frankston and Dandenong feature such frequent service over only about a 8 or 9 hour span, meaning that there would be a lot of trips that people would enjoy frequent service in one direction but not both.   

The expansion of the frequent network gives some needed momentum that will hopefully generate upgrades on other lines. And the simple through-running free of loop reversals or transposals will hopefully set the standard for other lines, especially the cross-city group when that revives as Sandringham to Newport in a few months, then greenfields timetables on other groups and finally the City Loop Reconfiguration. 

Index to Timetable Tuesday items here