Mr Baird was onsite as the first mega Tunnel Boring Machine, Elizabeth, broke through into the future Norwest Station area - just days after the fourth and final machine, Maria, started digging.
“This is an exciting day for Sydneysiders and another clear sign that construction of this critical rail link is powering ahead,” Mr Baird said.
“It was only in September that we launched this first massive machine at Bella Vista – in that time it has tunnelled 2.1 kilometres to reach today’s historic breakthrough at Norwest.
All four 900 tonne machines are now in the ground digging Australia’s longest railway tunnels.
Mr Baird said the North West Rail Link was on track to begin for customers in the first half of 2019.
The North West Rail Link includes eight new railway stations, 4,000 commuter car parking spaces and a train every four minutes in the peak, or 15 trains an hour.
In tunnelling to Norwest from the Bella Vista tunnelling site, TBM1 Elizabeth has:
• Excavated more than 206,000 tonnes of crushed rock, both sandstone and shale.
• Installed more than 7,300 concrete segments to line the new rail tunnel.
• Been home to 85 workers, including tunnellers, maintenance crews, geologists, surveyors and engineers, who combined have spent more than 25,000 hours underground, and
• Had 40 hardened steel cutters on her cutter head replaced, worn down from the harsh forces of cutting the Sydney sandstone and shale.
Over the coming weeks, Elizabeth will be moved through the Norwest Station area, before setting off again towards Showground Station as the other three machines Florence, Isabelle and Maria continue their work.
