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Train travel times between Wollongong and Sydney haven’t improved since the days of the steam engine. That’s the contention of Cath Blakey, Greens candidate in this Saturday’s Wollongong byelection, who cited an 1930s advertisement for a “fast train service” promising a 90-minute trip from Sydney to Wollongong. Ms Blakey said that, almost a century later, the train times between Wollongong and Sydney haven’t gotten any faster. “A vintage poster from the 1930s proclaiming ‘Sydney to Wollongong one-and-a-half hours’ shows that there has been no improvement in travel times between Wollongong and Sydney in the past 80 years,” Ms Blakey said. “That same trip today takes anywhere from one hour, 27 minutes, to one hour 57 minutes.” Express services between Wollongong and Central can take between 86 and 93 minutes, depending on the time of day. The travel times can blow out to close to two hours if a commuter has to change trains at Thirroul. “It is hard to believe that Wollongong train passengers spend at least as long, and sometimes longer, getting to Sydney than we did in the 1930s,” Ms Blakey said. “We need improvements to the timetable, with at least double the number of local services. “A large city like Wollongong needs more than one local all-stations service an hour.” Until travel times improved, Ms Blakey was calling for free WiFi on South Coast trains “to allow people to work and use this time productively”. Greens MP and Transport Spokesperson Dr Mehreen Faruqi criticised the state government for looking to spend money on the F6 extension rather than the rail line. “Putting money into public transport could really revolutionise the Illawarra line,” Ms Faruqi said. “Trains could run faster, be more reliable and more comfortable. “But instead this government is resurrecting a 1950s toll road in the proposed F6. “It seems they have money for everything except publicly-operated public transport.” Transport for NSW was contacted for comment.

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