Minister for Transport Gladys Berejiklian today announced the NSW Government has completed Opal electronic ticketing on the train network and will now move to the rollout on buses.
Opal is now live at 66 extra stations on the Central Coast, Hunter and Blue Mountains lines today – completing the rollout of Opal on all Sydney Ferries services and 308 suburban and intercity train stations.
"This is a landmark day for public transport customers. We have provided electronic ticketing for any customer travelling on the entire Sydney Trains and NSW TrainLink intercity networks," Ms Berejiklian said.
"I am pleased to announce we’re now shifting our attention to buses and from Monday 14 April, customers on 24 bus routes in northern Sydney’s Kuring-gai and Hornsby region will have access to all the benefits of the Opal card."
The extra routes provide services to the Berowra, Hornsby, Macquarie University, Gordon and Chatswood areas and carry 3.6 million customer trips every year, travelling more than 5.1 million kilometres.
"I have always said the bus rollout is the most challenging phase - technologically and operationally," Ms Berejiklian said.
"Now that we have completed the rollout of Opal onto trains and ferries, we can focus on introducing Opal for customers on more than 5,000 buses around Sydney and the regions."
The bus rollout on Monday 14 April will extend the Opal bus customer trial, launched in September last year, from the 594 route to every route from the Transdev-operated Mount Kuring-gai bus depot covering bus services 556 to 599.
With Opal, bus customers simply tap on when they’re boarding the bus, and tap off as they’re stepping off. Opal automatically calculates bus fares based on on-board GPS technology, accurately measuring the straight line distance from tap on to tap off.
Opal fares for buses include:
- Cheaper adult single bus fares by up to 9 per cent compared to MyZone tickets;
- Opal Weekly Travel Reward, earned with 8 paid journeys on Opal making bus travel twice a day Monday to Friday cheaper than a MyBus TravelTen;
- A more customer-friendly bus-to-bus transfer fare system - if your transfer is within 60 minutes you will only pay one fare for your whole journey.
Because Opal is precise and the current system isn’t, there will be some examples where a journey’s fare moves to a different fare band, and some customers will pay less.
"Opal provides cheaper fares and means you never have to worry about queuing for a ticket or being caught out with no coins again," Ms Berejiklian said.
Opal is now accepted on all Sydney Ferries services from Manly to Parramatta and all train stations from Bathurst to Bondi Junction and Dungog to Bomaderry plus the 333 bus route from Circular Quay to North Bondi and the 594 bus route.
From this week, the Child/Youth Opal card has been available, with all the benefits, at half the price.
"The new green coloured Child/Youth Opal card works in the same easy and convenient way as the Adult Opal card, with child fares at 50 per cent of an adult fare," Ms Berejiklian said.
To order an Adult or Child/Youth card go to www.opal.com.au or call 13 67 25 (13 OPAL). You can also visit the Transport for NSW stall at the Sydney Easter Show and get your Opal card on the spot.
Bus rollout map for Kuring-gai and Hornsby region (pdf 30KB)
Opal available on all trains from today as bus rollout kicks off (pdf 84KB)