A date has been set for the opening of the eight-kilometre extension of Melbourne’s South Morang train line to Mernda, in the city’s north-east, following successful testing earlier this month.
Trains will return to Mernda for the first time since 1959 when the extension opens to passengers on Sunday, August 26, 2018, the state government has announced.
The South Morang Line will be renamed the Mernda Line as a result of the extension.
The government is able to set a firm opening date thanks to successful testing of track, overhead wiring and rail infrastructure took place earlier this month. The project’s construction team is now putting the finishing touches on the three new stations along the extension, Middle Gorge, Hawkstowe and Mernda.
Driver training along the new track will begin in the coming weeks.
Premier Daniel Andrews said the opening date would also trigger the addition of new services to the Metro Trains Melbourne timetable, with 190 new train services added, and many existing services extended each week across the Mernda, Werribee, Hurstbridge and Dandenong Corridor lines.
“This is the first new rail line in 60 years,” the premier said on July 22. “We said we’d deliver better public transport to get people in Melbourne’s north where they need to go, sooner – and that’s exactly what we’ve done.
“Whether it’s here in Mernda or across our growing suburbs, we’re investing in the services local families need.”
“It was a Labor Government that extended the line from Epping to South Morang and the Andrews Labor Government will open this new rail line ahead of schedule and within budget,” transport minister Jacinta Allan added, “we’re getting it done.”
Passenger trains will return almost 60 years after they left Mernda, when the Whittlesea line was decommissioned in 1959.
The state expects the three new stations to cater for up to 8,000 commuters a day, helping to ease congestion along Plenty and Yan Yean roads.