Liverpool & Inner West Line
The T3 Liverpool & Inner West Line is a suburban rail service operated by Sydney Trains in the Inner West and Western suburbs of Sydney. It operates from the City Circle to via the Main Suburban railway line to and the Main Southern railway line from there to Liverpool.
Since 2024, the line has been numbered T3 and is coloured orange on maps and wayfinding information.
History
Early history
The section of the Main Suburban railway line used by Liverpool & Inner West Line services is the oldest railway in New South Wales, having opened in 1855. The section of the Main Southern railway line from to via that it also uses is newer, having opened between 1912 and 1924 as deviation to provide a more direct route to. Electrification to Liverpool was completed by 1929, after which electric passenger suburban services began operating the same route from Liverpool to the City Circle via Regents Park as they do today.T3 Bankstown Line (2013–2024)
Following the 2011 state election, the newly elected O'Farrell government embarked on reform of transport in New South Wales, creating a new organisation, Transport for NSW, in November of that year. This was followed up with another government reform, which saw Sydney Trains take over operation of the Sydney suburban rail network from CityRail in July 2013.Transport for NSW developed a new rail timetable, which was put into effect on 20 October 2013. The 2013 timetable was designed to integrate the projects of the Rail Clearways Program, a 2004 plan to divide the network's fourteen metropolitan rail lines into five independent "clearways" by installing extra tracks, passing loops, turnouts and turnbacks at pinch points around the network, such as at and Lidcombe. By 2013, the Rail Clearways Program was substantially complete.
The 2013 timetable saw services from Liverpool to the City Circle via Regents Park, which had previously been operated by CityRail under the name Inner West Line, phased out. Instead, from 2013 stations on the Main Southern railway line between Lidcombe and Cabramatta were only serviced by the T3 Bankstown Line, a Sydney Trains continuation of earlier CityRail services on the Bankstown railway line. This service operated as two branches, one from Liverpool and one from Lidcombe, connecting to the City Circle via and instead of via the Main Suburban railway line. This configuration utilised the new turnback at Lidcombe, and reduced bottlenecking on the Main Suburban railway line. However, the changes attracted criticism due to the increased number of interchanges and increased travel time for passengers from stations west of Bankstown.