Sydney trains today: Services will run at a reduced capacity

NSW trains will again hit the tracks with a reduced capacity of 25 per cent as the showdown between the rail union and the government continues, leaving commuters frustrated.

After nearly 48 hours of rail turmoil in Sydney, the NSW government on Tuesday afternoon backed down in its fight with the Rail, Tram and Bus Union, withdrawing proceedings against it at the Fair Work Commission.

Trains will run freely across Sydney’s rail network on Wednesday after all services were cancelled in crippling outage on Monday (pictured, commuters on Tuesday)

Trains on Tuesday operated at limited capacity, with buses supplementing some services. The same limited service will continue on Wednesday and for the rest of the week, Transport for NSW confirmed to AAP.

‘As a minimum, the rail timetable being operated today will continue for the remainder of this week to ensure a basic level of frequency for customers who rely on our services while protected industrial action continues,’ it said.

In a bid to keep peace talks moving, the government is set to meet the union later this week to discuss the city’s train fleet, wages and safety.

Mr Elliot said neither he nor Premier Dominic Perrottet (pictured) knew about the city-wide shutdown until they woke up and checked their emails at 4am

Bemused Sydney Trains workers (pictured) were seen at train stations and depots with nothing to do on Monday with the cancellations catching some by surprise 

Transport Minister David Elliott told reporters at a press conference the government’s withdrawal was ‘in the interest of transparency and goodwill’.

RTBU Secretary Alex Claassens described the union’s industrial position as ‘vindicated’, and reiterated that the shuttering of the network this week was ordered by NSW transport officials.

With the stoush at the industrial umpire now put aside, Mr Claassens said the challenge was to get the system ‘back up and running properly’, and pointed to Monday for a possible resumption of regular services. 

Sydney Trains bosses suddenly shut down the network with a 1.38am ‘dummy spit’ email in a dramatic escalation to a dispute with the union (pictured, Sydney Trains workers on Monday)

Millions of commuters woke up on Monday morning to find they had no way to get to work, choking roads with traffic jams up to 22km long 

‘We’re fairly confident we can do that, even with our protected action in place,’ he said.

The system shutdown on Monday blindsided about half a million commuters, with many left stranded across Sydney, Newcastle, the Central Coast, Blue Mountains and Illawarra.

The union at the time insisted limited industrial action planned for the day would not have affected safety and workers were ready to run the trains.

The RTBU has been at loggerheads with the government since 2021 over a new enterprise agreement, with concerns regarding safety guarantees, hygiene and privatisation resulting in two work stoppages since September.