George Street closure plunges city into traffic chaos

Workers in the CBD have been confronted by massive delays across the city as a result of the ongoing partial closure of George Street.

The chaos came to a head on Monday morning (January 5) when some busses took over two hours to cross the Sydney Harbor Bridge

The work is part of the South East Light Rail ‘early works’, but has left commuters and business owners confused and angered. They had previously been told that work on George Street would not start until after ANZAC day.

The Minister for Transport Gladys Berejiklian is on leave and had to be represented by the Roads Minister, Duncan Gay.

“It’s not the sort of day that I like, it was a pretty crappy morning,” he said.

“We did learn some stuff, and if we don’t learn from what happened today we deserve a good kick in the tail.”

“It is our belief that problems in the future have been addressed.”

Despite this claim, commuters have been warned to expect delays over the next fortnight as the work continues, but not on the same scale as Monday.

Work on George Street has been closed most Sunday nights for the last month as exploratory work was undertaken, but this is the first time it has encroached on business hours.

Underneath George Street is a maze of communications, gas and electricity infrastructure which will make the excavation a painstaking task.

The full project is due for completion in 2018 meaning that works of some form will be ongoing for the next three years.

Early digging at Moore Park has largely been unhindered.