Cubic Transportation Systems and New South Wales Government Complete Opal Card Rollout on Sydney Trains
SYDNEY (PRWEB) April 21, 2014 -- Cubic Transportation Systems and the New South Wales (NSW) state government are celebrating the successful – and ahead of schedule – rollout of the new Opal smart card to all train stations in the greater Sydney area.
Opal became available to all train passengers in the region on April 11 in what the state Minister for Transport Gladys Berejiklian described as an important milestone for public transport. The trains are the backbone of the public transport network in the greater Sydney area, carrying more than 304 million passengers a year and averaging about 1.5 million trips each working day.
Cubic leads the Pearl consortium, which is working with Transport for NSW to roll out the Opal card, one of the largest smart card ticketing projects in the world.
Cubic Australasia’s managing director Tom Walker said the train rollout was fast tracked to finish early, a considerable achievement given the complexity of the project. Cubic’s installation team worked around the clock to complete installation of Opal devices in 308 train stations in just under three and a half months.
“They were part of a much larger team working on the Opal train project, including specialists from Transport for NSW, Sydney Trains and NSW TrainLink,” he said. “Getting to this stage is a major achievement for everyone involved in the project and a very powerful endorsement of the value of teamwork. However, there is much work still to be done and no one is breaking out the champagne just yet.”
With both the trains and ferries now online, the next major task is installing Opal equipment on 5,000 buses in the greater Sydney area with light rail to follow in 2015.
Minister Berejiklian said the Opal card was already transforming the way people move around Sydney with almost 9 million journeys taken on trains, buses and ferries using Opal.
“More than 185,000 people have now signed up for Opal cards. Now that we have finalized the train rollout, as customers hear about the benefits of using Opal, we are seeing more and more people applying for a card,” she said.
About Cubic Corporation
Cubic® Transportation Systems, Inc., is part of Cubic Corporation. Cubic Corporation is the parent company of three major business segments. Cubic Defense Systems is a leading provider of realistic combat training systems and secure communications systems. Mission Support Services is a leading provider of training, operations, maintenance, technical and other support services for U.S. and allied nations.
Cubic Transportation Systems, Inc., is a leading integrator of payment and information technology and services for intelligent travel solutions. Cubic delivers integrated systems for transportation and traffic management, delivering tools for travelers to choose the smartest and easiest way to travel and pay for their journeys, and enabling transportation authorities and agencies to manage demand across the entire transportation network – all in real-time. Cubic specializes in design, development, manufacture, supply, installation, integration, services and information. Services provided by Cubic include on-site management, central systems, operations support, patron support, business support and field services.
Every year, more than 23 billion transportation payment transactions are processed using Cubic payment and information systems worldwide. Cubic has delivered over 20 regional back office operations which together integrate over 130 transport operators and serve over 38 million people every day in major markets around the world. Active projects include London; Brisbane (Southeast Queensland) region, Australia; New York/New Jersey region; Washington, D.C. /Baltimore/Virginia region; Los Angeles region; San Diego region; San Francisco region; Minneapolis/St. Paul; Chicago; Atlanta region; Miami (South Florida) region; Vancouver and Edmonton, Canada; Sydney (New South Wales), Australia; Germany; and Scandinavia.
For more information about Cubic, see the company’s website at http://www.cubic.com/.
Contacts:
John MacGregor
Managing Director
MPR
PH: 61-2-9969-3600
Cell: 61-414-445-447
[email protected]
Timothy A. Hill
Director of Corporate Communications
Cubic Corporation
PH: 858-505-2430
Timothy Hill, Cubic Corporation, http://www.cubic.com, +1 (858) 505-2430, [email protected]
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