A really insightful analysis of why this keeps happening in The Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2025/may/21/why-are-sydney-trains-delays-so-bad-nsw-rail-network

Along with archaic practices (carbon paper notes?!?!), interlining is singled out:

"While technical issues are unavoidable on a rail network that hosts 400m trips each year, the latest outage has reignited the nagging question on the minds of millions of Sydneysiders: how can just one incident on one train at a station with multiple tracks bring down an entire city’s rail network?

...

"The answer to the first question is easier to comprehend, and dates back to plans made in the early 1900s – including a famous vision for new lines from Sydney Harbour Bridge engineer John Bradfield – about how to expand the rail network to cater to a growing Sydney.

"Rather than a master plan for new lines independent of each other – as modern metro and underground systems were increasingly being built throughout the 20th century – the approach for Sydney was to take advantage of the huge capacity of the six tracks that comprise its main western railway between Central and Strathfield.

"In cities such as London, commuters can avoid a bottleneck or outage on one line by switching to another to dodge a problem section of track. But almost all heavy rail services in Sydney’s suburban network – including trains to the Central Coast, Blue Mountains, City Circle or Airport – are routed to pass through the Central-Strathfield corridor.

“'A lot of our lines are tangled with each other,' Sydney Trains CEO, Matt Longland, said. 'At this critical pinch point … one incident in a location like this can bring down a significant part of the network.'"

Coincidentally, interlining is also why issues on one line end up affecting multiple lines on Melbourne's network as well.

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