With Sydney’s new airport up and running, a key question has lingered amidst the excitement: how does one get there?
Armed with fake luggage and a keen eye for bus routes, the Herald’s western Sydney reporters set a challenge to see who could make it to the airport the quickest via public transport for a real flight. Our goal was to arrive the recommended two hours before a Jetstar flight to the Gold Coast.
In theory, it’s easy: get the metro. But the Western Sydney International Airport metro line is not due to be completed until December 2027 at earliest, so there are currently limited public transport options, in addition to driving.
We picked the three largest western Sydney hubs – Parramatta, Penrith and Campbelltown – as the starting points for our journeys.
9am: My plan to get this flight has just changed for a third time. I’d initially wanted to take WSI’s much-advertised $25, 50-minute “super shuttle” bus service that runs direct between Parramatta and the airport. But it’s only running twice a day – and the first service leaves after my flight is meant to take off. Next best option was getting a FlixBus, the infamously cheap European green bus company now operating in Australia. Its website boasted about a $3 ticket for a bus leaving at just the right time. But now it has disappeared from the website.
10.30am: It’s going to take me longer, but I’m getting the train to St Marys to join the dedicated free shuttle bus. The train is empty, and I’ve made a discovery: I thought the FlixBus service had disappeared because it was full, but it turns out the company just cancelled the service for today.
10.55am: St Mary’s train station is incredibly noisy because it’s almost surrounded by a construction site for the new metro
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