Sydney metro: driverless train breaks down and has to be driven by staff

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/may/29/sydney-metro-driverless-train-breaks-down-and-has-to-be-driven-by-staff

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A driverless train which broke down on Sydney’s new metro line had to be driven to the next station by a so-called “customer journey coordinator”.

Transport for NSW blamed Wednesday afternoon’s glitch on a communication fault on a train between Epping and Cherrybrook stations as it was heading towards Tallawong.

Essentially the driverless train stopped communicating with the system, a Transport for NSW spokesman said.

'Unreal': Sydney's rush hour goes smoothly as driverless metro trains make weekday debut

The train was then driven to Cherrybrook station “under the control of a customer journey coordinator”. A technician was also sent to investigate.

The troubled train remained in operation and customers continued their journey to Tallawong. It was then returned to the depot for checks and a replacement train was sent out.

“One train, one glitch, and rectified within 25 minutes, that’s the good news,” the transport minister, Andrew Constance, told Seven News.

A Transport for NSW spokesman said: “While there were some delays as a result of the incident, services are returning to normal with 16 trains expected to be operating in the system for the afternoon peak.”

However, not all travellers were impressed with the response by Transport for NSW.

Delays happened but at least you knew why. Today on the @SydneyMetro was different. They said it was a problem with a train between Epping and Cherrybrook at around 1pm. The system was still a mess at 3, and still acting up at 5.

Sydney's driverless Metro has been rescued by a driver. The control centre lost contact with one of the new trains today, so a Metro employee had to jump on board and nurse the broken train back to base, causing delays down the line. https://t.co/DHiaem0gNi #7NEWS pic.twitter.com/7oMinyycph

Normal train services were planned for the rest of Wednesday evening.

The Metro northwest line opened on Sunday with just under 140,000 people taking advantage of free trips on the day.

On Monday there were some 66,008 customer trips and on Tuesday there were 72,401 trips.

More than 20,000 people worked on the $7.3bn project over eight years, and work is now underway to extend the line from Chatswood to Bankstown.