Sydney Metro’s second tunnel boring machine (TBM) has started work to help deliver 31 kilometres of tunnels between Marrickville and Chatswood.
TBM Mum Shirl was launched at Marrickville and will work alongside TBM Nancy, which launched three weeks ago.
The two TBMs will construct 8.1 kilometres of twin metro tunnels from Marrickville to the new Sydney Metro stations of Waterloo, Central, Pitt Street, Martin Place and Barangaroo, where they will then be removed from underground.
TBM Mum Shirl is around 15o metres long and is designed to cut through the hard sandstone and shale of Sydney’s geology. It is expected to tunnel an average of 120 metres per week.
Two additional TBMs will dig 6.2 kilometres from Chatswood to the edge of Sydney Harbour, with a fifth machine designed to deliver the twin tunnels under the harbour.
The TBM is named after Mum Shirl, an Aboriginal woman who dedicated her life to her community and raised 60 foster children. She was a Wiradjuri woman born Colleen Shirley Perry around 1924 and died in 1998.
Mum Shirl was involved in establishing the Aboriginal Legal Service, the Aboriginal Medical Service, the Aboriginal Black Theatre, the Aboriginal Children’s service, the Aboriginal Housing Company and the Detoxification Centre.
She was made a Member of the Order of the British Empire in 1977 and received the Order of Australia in 1985.
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