Tunnelling starts for Sydney Metro West

TBM Daphne is already 150m into its 11km journey from The Bays to Sydney Olympic Park, and TBM Beatrice has excavated 45m on the parallel tunnel.

The two double-shield, hard rock machines include refurbished cutterheads, front shields and gripper shields cutterheads from the TBMs used on the Sydney Metro City & Southwest project.

Two of three roadheaders have also started excavating tunnels that will connect the Sydney Metro West line to a new stabling and maintenance facility at Clyde.

The twin metro tunnels are part of the Central Tunnelling Package awarded to the Acciona Ferrovial joint venture in July 2021. The A$1.96bn (US1.29bn) contract also includes excavation and civil works for five new stations at The Bays, Five Dock, Burwood North, North Strathfield and Sydney Olympic Park; a crossover cavern at Burwood North and one of the two precast concrete factories at Eastern Creek; more than 70,000 concrete segments to line the twin tunnels; and two access shafts at Burwood North and The Bays.

TBM Daphne is named in honour of athlete Daphne Hilton who competed in three Paralympic Games between 1960-1968, winning 14 medals across athletics, swimming, archery, table tennis and fencing. 

TBM Beatrice is named after Beatrice Bush who sold newspapers for over 25 years from a traffic island in the area.

John Holland, CPB Contractors and Ghella joint venture (JCG JV) has the Eastern Tunnelling contract to deliver 3.5km of tunnels between The Bays and Hunter Street in the Sydney CBD.

On the A$2.16bn (US$1.42bn) Western Tunnelling package, the Gamuda Australia and Laing O’Rourke Consortium will use autonomous TBMs for the first time in Australia. The two Herrenknecht machines will build the 9km twin tunnels between Sydney Olympic Park and Westmead.

Sydney Metro West will double rail capacity between Sydney’s two biggest CBDs once passenger services commence in 2030.