Sydney commuters are yet again enduring packed trains and widespread cancellations as rail industrial action drags on despite a potential breakthrough in negotiations.
Rail workers are striking between 10am and 4pm today but commuters are set to face frustrating travel conditions all day and night.
Patience is running low after months of disruption and although the rail union said it was only expecting a few cancellations today, commuters are reporting otherwise.
"I am sick of it, it's difficult for me to get to uni and work on time ... everyone has places to be," one commuter told the ABC.
Yesterday the stalemate between the union and state government eased, with the government offering a legal deed that addresses safety concerns on the new intercity train fleet.
However, the union said this came too late to call off today's strike, as it takes 48 hours to make any changes to the timetable.
Rail, Train and Bus Union (RTBU) secretary Alex Claassens said clarification was needed on some parts of the deed, but he is hopeful that if union members agree to it, next Wednesday's planned industrial action could be called off.
"The trains they bought from South Korea as driver-only trains were never going to work on the NSW rail system. We were always going to fight that fight," he said.
"[The deed] has to guarantee they are going to go ahead and fix the trains and the money being used to fix the trains isn't coming out of our wages and conditions."
Mr Claassens said the deed was "do-able" and he would hopefully be able to "hammer out" a few last sticking points with the transport department today.
Mr Claassens said services were running at about 80 per cent today and the trains "should run ok".
However, the system appears to be struggling.
Medical receptionist Georgina Beattie was commuting on the T4 line this morning and said people were crammed onto the trains that were still running.
"I got on at Gymea and it was absolutely packed," she said.
"You could barely actually get onto the train, I was really shocked."
Passengers on the T8 line have posted on social media, saying carriages are completely packed meaning they cannot get on.
Dozens of trains on this line have been cancelled, and Sydney Trains says it will be affected until the end of service tonight.
Trains are not running on the T7 line at all, with two replacement buses operating instead.
Sydney Trains say some cancellations may also occur tomorrow but the network will be less impacted.
The train network has been disrupted by industrial action since June and on many occasions, passengers have been urged not to catch trains at all.
The union refused to call off strikes until the government presented a legally enforceable agreement to modify the intercity fleet.
Regional Transport and Roads Minister Sam Farraway said the deed offered last night was "rock solid".
"[It's a] legally binding guarantee to make the RTBU's requested modifications to the NIF. It is now up to the RTBU to sign on the dotted line and give peace to commuters," he said.
Minister for Employee Relations Damien Tudehope said the deed was important to protect the public from further union interference in the operation of the NIF.
"The government's commitment was always to enter into a legal deed to ensure that the RTBU also lived up to its side of the bargain and allowed staff to operate these state-of-the-art trains," Mr Tudehope said.
The inter-city fleet, meant to travel from Sydney to Lithgow, Kiama and the Central Coast, arrived in Sydney in 2020 but has been sitting in storage since.
RTBU members have refused to operate the trains, claiming that, in their current form, guards cannot adequately monitor platforms and check that gaps are clear from the new trains to ensure passenger safety.
Modifying the trains is expected to cost the government around $260 million.
