The Sydney Metro travels under Sydney Harbor for the first time

While most of the city slept, something big was moving underneath. Up to 40 meters below the surface, a new train passed under Sydney Harbor for the first time.

At 2am on Friday, the single-decker tube train from Tallawong, in the city’s north-west, passed through Chatswood and North Sydney before passing under the famous body of water. We continued to Barangaroo.

The first train to grace the $20.5 billion Metro City and Southwest Line, an extension of the Metro Northwest that will eventually reach Sydenham, was tested by traffic officials and engineers until 6am.

It’s a historic milestone on the decades-long journey to a city-wide subway service and happened nearly 100 years after the first locomotive train passed through the port on the bridge.

“Everything went really smoothly last night,” said Hugh Lawson, Sydney Metro City & Southwest Project Manager, who spent the early hours watching the train travel beneath Chatswood Harbour. “Achieving this massive, massive historic milestone [required] a very controlled process where all steps are followed very carefully.”

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“I was very excited, despite the early hour. The amount of work that had to come together to reach this milestone has been phenomenal and puts us on track to have the railroad operational in 2024,” he said, referring to Metro City and the Southwest’s opening date lines.

The first train sits in Barangaroo and will head back north on Wednesday during further testing.

Transport Minister Jo Haylen said the tests were an important milestone.