We’ve found out how many times the escalator at your station broke down last year – and why

They’re highly complex engineering marvels – but we only stop to think about them when something goes wrong. And according to new data we’ve obtained, things are going wrong on our city’s escalators a lot.

Escalators across Sydney’s train and metro stations spent more than 13,000 hours broken down over the past year, and commuters passing through metro and train stations in Chatswood and Parramatta were most affected, with systems at both stations out for a total of more than 80 days each.

An escalator closed for maintenance at Town Hall Station last month.Credit: Dion Georgopoulos

The revelations are uncovered in escalator breakdown logs created by Transport for NSW, which were released to Liberal MP Matt Cross under freedom of information laws and obtained by The Sydney Morning Herald.

Of the hundreds of escalators managed by the agency for commuter use throughout public transport hubs, 2036 breakdown incidents were reported between November 1, 2023, and October 30, 2024.

The most common cause of breakdowns at train stations (reasons were not listed for breakdowns at metro stations) was items becoming caught in the systems, with 17 specific reports of shoes becoming stuck – mostly at the comb plate, where the steps meet the floor at the top and bottom.

Brake faults and power outages also contributed significantly to the number of breakdowns.

But the prize for the most problematic escalator across the network? That honour is shared by escalator five at Castle Hill metro station and escalator four at Kellyville metro station. Both had 34 breakdowns over the year.

Central Station had a combined 319 breakdowns in its dozens of escalators, while Parramatta Station reported 195. Wynyard Station (157) and Epping Station (148) followed.

The data does not appear to include stations on the airport line, including Green Square, which is home to one of the most persistently out-of-order escalators.

Repair time varies

While the logs showed most escalators were being repaired within several hours, one escalator at Chatswood – taking passengers from the concourse to platforms three and four – took more than 45 days to repair.

NSW opposition transport spokeswoman Natalie Ward said the data revealed the government’s “inability to get the basics right”.

“Repetitive breakdowns show there is no plan and a complete breakdown in understanding the needs of the travelling public,” she said.

A Sydney Trains spokesperson said their systems worked 99.03 per cent of the time, and escalators were repaired within an average of 13.6 hours.

It has an annual budget of $15 million for routine maintenance of its escalators and lifts.

Escalators in metro stations operate correctly 99.4 per cent of the time, a spokesperson for Sydney Metro said, with the average resolution time being eight hours (it operates 171 escalators, fewer than Sydney Trains).

A complicated fix

If escalators were designed today, Lift Engineering Society of Australia president John Tibbitts is not sure if they would be approved.

“It is complicated. Would you get it through the [approvals process]? … There’s a lot of moving parts and it’s not so difficult to get things caught.”

Individual escalator steps are connected to two sets of wheels: one near the bottom and one near the top. They allow the step to stay flat before rotating underneath when it reaches the end. The step chain, which moves the wheels along, was among the most common causes of breakdowns.

Kareem Nader, director at the Sydney-based Elevator Consultancy Service, said the whole escalator system was “built on a truss, small rails that basically support the steps and step chains”.

“There are two main step chains. They carry the steps, and it just keeps going round and round,” he said. Fixing the chains requires opening the metal sheets at the top and bottom. A new set of step chains can set an operator back by $40,000-60,000.

Comb plates regularly break when things get stuck too, but that’s part of the design.

“They’re designed to break off because we’d rather break the tooth and let the [stuck item] release than get caught,” said Tibbitts, who is also the chairman of the Standards Australia committee that is writing safety codes for escalators and lifts.

“I’ve had kids get their fingers caught in that area. Particularly [common] is teenagers who sit on the steps and then as the steps come together pinch themselves.”

The one thing he said could not be designed against was people standing on handrails and surfing down: “How drunk do you have to be?”

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