Sydney Trains and NSW TrainLink have recorded below target punctuality performance in February 2020, with only 83 per cent of services arriving within five minutes for Sydney Trains services, and 6 minutes for NSW TrainLink services.
The target for both services is to have at least 92 per cent of peak services arrive within these benchmarks.
The February target is the lowest out of the publicly available monthly data going back to July 2018.
A spokesperson for Sydney trains said the result in February can be attributed to severe weather.
“There were multiple weather related events across the rail network in February, including electrical storms causing a tree to falling on overhead wiring at Blackheath, landslips at Artarmon and Leura, flooding at Olympic Park and on the South Coast, elements affecting infrastructure at Hawkesbury River, Lidcombe and on the Southern Highlands, and ongoing bushfire recovery work on the Blue Mountains Line between Mount Victoria and Lithgow.
“This is in addition to a power supply issue at the Hornsby Maintenance Centre, a train requiring mechanical repairs at Lidcombe and a medical emergency at Erskineville,” said the spokesperson.
Services on the T1 line had the worst punctuality result across the network in February, with only 77 per cent of services meeting the benchmark. Within the T1 network, western line services recorded the lowest performance, at 74 per cent reaching the on-time benchmark.
T3 Bankstown services were the best performers during February, however at 87.2 per cent still did not reach the benchmark.
Services were generally closer to being on time in the afternoon peak than in the morning peak. Overall punctuality for the financial year ending February 2020 is 90.9.
Sydney Trains serviced 420 million trips in the last financial year, a 35 per cent increase from 5 years ago. 3,200 services provide 1.4 million people’s journeys each weekday.