Railways and Tramways of Australia

25 March

View of various railway maintenance facilities at Auburn, 8 December 2010. Photo: Beau Giles, Wikimedia Commons.

Keeping the trains running

Auburn Service Centre was officially opened on 25 March 1994.

Sydney’s electric train fleet was maintained at the Electric Car Workshops (Elcar) at Chullora from the beginning of electric train services in 1926. However, this facility was closed in March 1994 and maintenance work was transferred to the new centre at Auburn.

The Auburn Service Centre was officially opened by NSW Minister for Transport Bruce Baird. It took over responsibility for maintaining the entire fleet of Sydney’s suburban and intercity double-deck trains, which were then operated by CityRail. This represented around 1500 carriages. Additionally, Auburn maintained freight bogies and wheelsets. Although minor work was undertaken at suburban depots, all major work was undertaken at Auburn.

The new facility was operated by MainTrain, a branch of A Goninan & Co. At the time this was Australia’s largest privatised railway maintenance contract. Auburn Service Centre was said to be the most technically advanced rolling stock maintenance centre in Australia. Features included a four-track component changeout workshop, separate bogie, electrical, machine and brake workshops, bogie wash plant, weighing station and wheel lathe. The new workshops had the capacity to overhaul more than 400 carriages each year.

With the introduction of the Millennium (M Set) trains in 2002 and OSCAR (H Set) trains in 2006, maintenance facilities began to be provided elsewhere. However, a new facility was opened at Auburn in 2010. Adjacent to the Auburn Service Centre, the Auburn Maintenance Centre took on responsibility for the new Waratah (A Set) suburban trains, which commenced service in 2011, and the Waratah Series 2 (B Set) trains, which began operating in 2018. These now represent the bulk of Sydney’s suburban train fleet.

Auburn continues the vital work of keeping the trains running.

Bibliography

‘Goninan’s Maintrain centre officially opened’, Railway Digest, vol. 32, no. 5, May 1994, pp 9, 12.

I Hammond, ‘Auburn Service Centre’, Transit Australia, vol. 49, no. 6, June 1994, pp 123–5.

G Ryan, ‘A review of Electrical Multiple Unit (EMU) rolling stock’, Railway Digest, vol. 32, no. 9, September 1994, pp 32–3.

‘Sydney update’, Railway Digest, vol. 48, no. 9, September 2010, p 16.