Perth's long-awaited airport rail line is finally open but WA mine workers want trains to start earlier to cater to fly-in-fly-out workers taking early morning flights.
The $1.86 billion Forrestfield-Airport Link was launched on Sunday, with full services starting at the new Redcliffe, Airport Central and High Wycombe station on Monday.
But with the first train of the day arriving at Perth Airport station at 5:30am, not everyone will be able to take advantage of the new services.
Fly-in-fly-out (FIFO) worker Richard O'Keefe travels from Rockingham, in Perth's south, to the airport each week.
He said he wouldn't get much use out of the new train.
"I'm not real happy with it to be quite frank," he said.
"I have always said that once it gets up and running, it still won't benefit us because the trains don't run early enough.
"Normally my flight is at 6:15 or 7:15 in the morning, every Monday morning so I can't use public transport at all, I just have to use Uber."
Steve Gibb travels up from Mandurah for his weekly flight to Newman agreed that train times needed to be changed across the network for it to become a suitable option for early morning travellers.
"It needs to leave way earlier in the morning from Mandurah, it leaves at 4:50am. Even 3am would be helpful for a lot of guys catching a flight out," he said
"Half the people are missing their flight, so all this infrastructure is not getting used for maximum time."
John Bartels had been flying out in the afternoon, but said rosters often changed.
"Perth Airport has needed a train station for a long time so it's so good it's here now," he said
"[But] for the earlier travellers this train won't suit unfortunately [and] the airport is extremely busy very early in the morning."
Union calls for 'tweak' of timetable
With dozens of flights leaving Perth Airport before 7am each day, WA's Mining and Energy Union called on the state government to work with the mining industry and 'tweak' the train schedule to accommodate site workers flying out early.
Union state secretary Greg Busson said most workers would have to arrive 60 to 90 minutes before take-off for their flight.
"It would be cutting it fine at this stage," he said.
"I think the government should be assessing people's rosters and flight times and canvassing the companies to see what time would be appropriate to get people out to the airport so they get out there with plenty of time.
"We would be encouraging them to do that and to make any changes required so we can get the maximum amount of people to use the service."
He said with most of the FIFO workers flying to site on Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday, he was open to a trial of earlier flights on those days, or a bus service to run alongside the new train.
Transport minister to look at numbers
WA's Transport Minister Rita Saffioti said while it was important to close the train line for maintenance, she would look at what options could be offered to early workers.
"That is an issue but we are looking at how we can reduce that maintenance windows ... until we do that we aren't able to extend those hours," she said.
'If we're seeing a lot of travel in particular from the city to the station we might try and bring on an earlier shuttle.
'We'll see the passenger numbers, we'll see exactly how many people are missing out and we'll see what we can do."
The new train service will cater to about 80 per cent of the airport's flights.
