Sydney Metro West marks another major milestone

29 Jul 2025 | Rail Express

The team celebrating their progress at Parramatta. Image: NSW Government

The Sydney Metro West project has reached a major milestone with the arrival of two tunnel boring machines (TBMs) at Parramatta’s metro station site.

Tunnelling is now 90 per cent complete on the project, which will connect Greater Parramatta to Sydney’s CB via a new 24-kilometre underground metro railway.

TBM Dorothy is at Parramatta after breaking through a solid rock wall to reach the site last week, while TBM Betty is more than 175 metres into its final stretch of tunnel to Westmead after leaving Parramatta on 17 July.

The machines have worked around the clock, five days a week for 17 months to build the tunnels between Sydney Olympic Park and Parramatta.

They have excavated approximately 1.25 million tonnes of earth and installed more than 48,000 precast concrete segments, each weighing up to 4 tonnes, to line the seven-kilometre tunnels.

Both TBMs will have finished the main line tunnels at the western end of the line by the end of 2025.

Six of the nine station boxes for the Sydney Metro West project – The Bays, Five Dock, Burwood North, North Strathfield Sydney Olympic Park and Westmead – have already been excavated and lined.

Work is continuing at Parramatta, Pyrmont and the Hunter Street station in the Sydney CBD.

Parramatta metro station will be part of a mixed-use development of four buildings spanning 24,150 square metres over the equivalent of two city blocks, providing about 100 new homes, office and retail spaces, dining and entertainment options.

The new transit hub will be a short stroll to nearby Eat Street, adjacent to Light Rail services and link directly to the new Civic Link, a 450-metre-long pedestrian spine connecting the metro precinct to the future Powerhouse Parramatta.