Sandringham line

The Sandringham line is a commuter railway line in the city of Melbourne, Australia. Operated by Metro Trains Melbourne, it is the city's fourth shortest metropolitan railway line at. The line runs from Flinders Street station in central Melbourne to Sandringham station in the south-east, serving 14 stations via South Yarra, Balaclava, Elsternwick, and Brighton. It operates from approximately 5am to 12am, daily, with 24 hour service available on Friday and Saturday nights. Trains on the Sandringham line run as six car formations, composed of two three-car sets of Comeng or Siemens Nexas trainsets.
Sections of the Sandringham line opened as early as 1859, with the line fully extended to Sandringham in 1887. A limited number of stations were operational when the line first opened, with infill stations progressively constructed between 1860 and 1912. The line was built to connect Melbourne with the suburbs of Balaclava, Elsternwick, Brighton, and Sandringham, amongst others. Minor upgrades have occurred since its opening, including historical level crossing removal works and regular infrastructure upgrades.

History

19th century

The Melbourne and Suburban Railway Company opened their line from Princes Bridge to a temporary station on Punt Road in February 1859, then to Cremorne in December of that year. Shortly after, the St Kilda and Brighton Railway Company opened their railway line from St Kilda to Bay Street in December 1859. Twelve months after that, the Melbourne and Suburban Railway Company extended their line from Cremorne to Chapel Street station, on the St Kilda and Brighton Railway Company's line, providing a second route to the city from the Brighton line. The following year, again in December, the St Kilda and Brighton Railway Company extended their line to Beach.
The link between St Kilda and Windsor, disused since 1862, was dismantled in 1867, although part of it at the Windsor end was used as a siding for some time afterwards. In 1865, the Melbourne and Hobson's Bay Railway Company, who owned the St Kilda line, purchased the Melbourne Suburban Railway Company and became the Melbourne and Hobson's Bay United Railway Company, and subsequently bought the St Kilda and Brighton Railway Company, which was in financial difficulties, for £99,500. The Victorian Government acquired the United railway company in July 1878.
In September 1887, the Brighton line was extended to Sandringham.

20th century

The Sandringham line became the first line in the state of Victoria to be provided with automatic signals, with the line as far as Elsternwick converted in stages from 1915 to 1918. Then in 1919, the Sandringham line became, with the line to Essendon, the first line in the country to be electrified. Automatic signalling was provided the rest of the way to Sandringham in two stages in during 1926.
When the underground City Loop line was designed, it was not intended to cater for trains on the Port Melbourne, St Kilda, and Sandringham lines. However, a crossover was installed near Richmond to allow Sandringham trains to cross to the tracks used by the Frankston, Pakenham, and Cranbourne line trains, which had access to the underground loop. In 1985, two Sandringham trains each way were altered to run via the underground loop, and in 1987, with the Port Melbourne and St Kilda lines converted to light rail operation, all off-peak and many peak trains were routed via the underground loop. The commencement of operations involved the service stopping at three new stations—Parliament, Melbourne Central, and Flagstaff. The Loop follows La Trobe and Spring Streets along the northern and eastern edges of the Hoddle Grid. The Loop connects with Melbourne's two busiest stations, Flinders Street and Southern Cross, via the elevated Flinders Street Viaduct. This would be until 1996 when timetable changes saw the Sandringham line taken out of the City Loop on weekdays and instead began running direct to and from Flinders Street. All weekend services still ran via the loop at this time.

21st century

In 2021, the metropolitan timetable underwent a major rewrite, resulting in all Sandringham line trains terminating at Flinders Street without operating through the City Loop.
As part of the opening of the Metro Tunnel, a new cross-city rail tunnel, corridor reorganisation of the Melbourne rail network is planned. Plans released by the Victorian Department of Transport and Planning indicate that the opening of the Metro Tunnel will see Frankston line services return to the City Loop. This will mean Frankston line trains will no longer through-run with Werribee and Williamstown line trains, with the Sandringham line through-running services to Werribee and Williamstown for the first time.
Stage 4 of the Network Development Plan – Metropolitan Rail proposed that the Upfield and Sandringham lines be joined via a reconfigured City Loop sometime in the 2030s.

Network and operations

Services

Services on the Sandringham line operates from approximately 5:00am to 12:00am daily and all night on Friday and Saturday nights. Services run every 7–8 minutes during peak hour, with services running every 15 minutes during the inter-peak period on weekdays, and every 20 minutes at night and during the day on weekends. Additionally, services run every 60 minutes overnight on Friday and Saturday nights as part of the Night Network. Services don't run via the City Loop, instead they run direct to Flinders Street.
As of December 2024, one express train operates during weekdays on the Sandringham line. This being the 6:05pm Flinders Street service from Sandringham.
From late April 2026, services on the Sandringham line will through run with the Werribee and Williamstown lines instead of terminating at Flinders Street.

Stopping patterns

Legend — Station status

◼ Premium Station – Station staffed from first to last train
◻ Host Station – Usually staffed during morning peak, however this can vary for different stations on the network.

Legend — Stopping patterns
Services do not operate via the City Loop

● – All trains stop
◐ – Some services do not stop
▲ – Only inbound trains stop
| – Trains pass and do not stop
Operators

The Sandringham line has had a total of 11 operators since its opening in 1859. The line was initially operated by the Melbourne and Suburban Railway Company, the St Kilda and Brighton Railway Company, the Melbourne Railway Company, and the Melbourne and Hobson's Bay Railway Company over the course of 19 years from 1859 till nationalisation in 1878. The majority of operations throughout its history have been government run: from 1878 until the 1999 privatisation of Melbourne's rail network, four different government operators have run the line. These operators, Victorian Railways, the Metropolitan Transit Authority, the Public Transport Corporation and Bayside Trains have a combined operational length of 121 years.
Bayside Trains was privatised in August 1999 and later rebranded M>Train. In 2002, M>Train was placed into receivership and the state government regained ownership of the line, with KPMG appointed as receivers to operate M>Train on behalf of the state government. Two years later, rival train operator Connex Melbourne took over the M>Train operations including the Sandringham line. Metro Trains Melbourne, the current private operator, then took over the operations in 2009. These private operators have had a combined operational period of years.

Operator	Assumed operations	Ceased operations	Length of operations
Melbourne and Suburban Railway Company*	1859	1862	3 years
St Kilda and Brighton Railway Company*	1859	1862	3 years
Melbourne Railway Company	1862	1865	3 years
Melbourne and Hobson's Bay Railway Company	1865	1878	13 years
Victorian Railways	1878	1983	105 years
Metropolitan Transit Authority	1983	1989	6 years
Public Transport Corporation	1989	1998	9 years
Bayside Trains	1998	1999	1 years
M>Train	1999	2004	5 years
Connex Melbourne	2004	2009	5 years
Metro Trains Melbourne	2009	incumbent	years

*Operated part of the route

Route

The Sandringham line forms a somewhat linear route with minor curves from the Melbourne central business district to its terminus in Sandringham. The route is long and is predominantly doubled tracked, however between Flinders Street station and Richmond, the track is widened to 12 tracks, narrowing to 6 tracks between Richmond and South Yarra before again narrowing to 2 tracks between South Yarra and Sandringham. After departing from its terminus at Flinders Street, the Sandringham line traverses mainly flat country with few curves and fairly minimal earthworks for most of the line. However, sections of the line have been elevated or lowering into a cutting to eliminate level crossings. Despite historical removals, there are numerous level crossings still present on the line with no current plans to remove them.
The line follows the same alignment as the Cranbourne, Pakenham, and Frankston lines with the four services splitting onto different routes at South Yarra. The Sandringham line continues on its south eastern alignment, whereas the Cranbourne, Pakenham, and Frankston lines takes an eastern alignment towards their final destinations. From Balaclava, the line is never more than ~ from the eastern shore of Port Phillip. All of the rail line goes through built-up suburbs towards its terminus in Sandringham.