Chart and table of population level and growth rate for the Sydney, Australia metro area from 1950 to 2025.

This dataset contains projected population figures from Transport for NSW’s Travel Zone Projection 2016 (TZP2016) model (formally known as LU16*). The data includes:

• Estimated Resident Population (ERP) (including 5-year age categories by sex);

• Population in occupied private dwellings (POPD)

• Population in non-private dwellings (PNPD); and

• Occupied private dwellings (OPD)

The TZP2016 projections reflect the Sydney Greater Metropolitan Area (GMA) and are provided on a 5-yearly basis for the period 2011-2056.

People often use different modes of transport at various times for a range of reasons, so it is important that we continue to listen to how people in NSW rate their experiences throughout their entire journey.\r \r Conducting the ‘Customer Satisfaction Index’ helps us gain insight into the experiences of our transport users, which helps us focus our efforts on improving transport services to meet the needs of NSW residents.\r \r We would like to thank the more than 34,000 people who provided their feedback, either online or face-to-face, for the most recent research, conducted in May 2024.\r \r

Public Transport in NSW##\r

Passengers impacted by disruptions due to adverse weather.\r \r Severe adverse weather events in early 2024 affected our public transport passengers, resulting in a slight decline in satisfaction with train timeliness. However, satisfaction with the ‘availability of information about service delays’ has slightly increased compared with six months ago.\r \r As preparation continued during May for the new Sydney Metro expansion, passengers were kept well informed to what to expect with changes to services. Consequently, passengers have remained highly satisfied, particularly with the ‘knowledge of staff’ and ‘information about delays’.\r \r As public transport patronage continued to increase, satisfaction levels for comfort and ‘personal space’ have slightly decreased for buses, light rail and ferries.\r \r

Road##\r

Severe weather in early 2024 also impacted road users in NSW, leading to a decline in satisfaction with journey time reliability for private vehicles and motorcycles across the state.\r \r Heavy vehicle users have previously reported low satisfaction with rest areas across NSW. We have been focusing on improving these facilities, and it’s encouraging to see that satisfaction levels have continued to rise.\r \r Active transport users remain highly satisfied, with cyclists increasingly pleased with the ‘ease of connecting to public transport’ and pedestrians appreciating ‘sharing footpaths with others safely’.\r \r

Point-to-Point##\r

Satisfaction among users of point-to-point services (taxis, rideshares and hire cars) remains stable overall, with customers most satisfied with their accessibility and convenience.\r \r

What’s Next##\r

We will continue engaging with our passengers to gain deeper insights into their experiences across NSW’s transport network. This feedback will guide us in prioritising areas of low and declining satisfaction, helping us work towards delivering a consistently positive experience throughout their journey.

Household Travel Survey (HTS) is the most comprehensive source of personal travel data for the Sydney Greater Metropolitan Area (GMA). This data explores average weekday travel patterns for residents in Sydney GMA.\r \r The Household Travel Survey (HTS) collects information on personal travel behaviour. The study area for the survey is the Sydney Greater Metropolitan Area (GMA) which includes Sydney Greater Capital City Statistical Area (GCCSA), parts of Illawarra and Hunter regions. All residents of occupied private dwellings within the Sydney GMA are considered within scope of the survey and are randomly selected to participate.\r The HTS has been running continuously since 1997/981 and collects data for all days through the year – including during school and public holidays.\r \r Typically, approximately 2,000-3,000 households participate in the survey annually. Data is collected on all trips made over a 24-hour period by all members of the participating households.\r \r Annual estimates from the HTS are usually produced on a rolling basis using multiple years of pooled data for each reporting year2. All estimates are weighted to the Australian Bureau of Statistics’ Estimated Resident Population, corresponding to the year of collection3. Unless otherwise stated, all reported estimates are for an average weekday.\r \r \r \r Due to disruptions in data collection resulting from the lockdowns during the COVID-19 pandemic, post-COVID releases of HTS data are based on a lower sample size than previous HTS releases. To ensure integrity of the results and mitigate risk of sampling errors some post-COVID results have been reported differently to previous years. Please see below for more information on changes to HTS post-COVID (2020/21 onwards).\r \r 1. Data collection for the HTS was suspended during lock-down periods announced by the NSW Government due to COVID-19.\r \r 2. Exceptions apply to the estimates for 2020/21 which are based on a single year of sample as it was decided not to pool the sample with data collected pre-COVID-19. \r \r 3. HTS population estimates are also slightly lower than those reported in the ABS census as the survey excludes overseas visitors and those in non-private dwellings.\r \r Changes to HTS post-COVID (2020/21 onwards)\r \r HTS was suspended from late March 2020 to early October 2020 due to the impact and restrictions of COVID-19, and again from July 2021 to October 2021 following the Delta wave of COVID-19. Consequently, both the 2020/21 and 2021/22 releases are based on a reduced data collection period and smaller samples.\r \r Due to the impact of changed travel behaviours resulting from COVID-19 breaking previous trends, HTS releases since 2020/21 have been separated from pre-COVID-19 samples when pooled. As a result, HTS 2020/21 was based on a single wave of data collection which limited the breadth of geography available for release. Subsequent releases are based on pooled post-COVID samples to expand the geographies included with reliable estimates.\r \r Disruption to the data collection during, and post-COVID has led to some adjustments being made to the HTS estimates released post-COVID:\r \r SA3 level data has not been released for 2020/21 and 2021/22 due to low sample collection.\r LGA level data for 2021/22 has been released for selected LGAs when robust Relative Standard Error (RSE) for total trips are achieved\r Mode categories for all geographies are aggregated differently to the pre-COVID categories\r Purpose categories for some geographies are aggregated differently across 2020/21 and 2021/22.\r A new data release – for six cities as defined by the Greater Sydney Commission - is included since 2021/22.\r Please refer to the Data Document for 2022/23 (PDF, 262.54 KB) for further details.\r \r \r RELEASE NOTE\r \r The latest release of HTS data is 15 May 2025. This release includes Region, LGA, SA3 and Six Cities data for 2023/24. Please see 2023/24 Data Document for details.\r \r A revised dataset for LGAs and Six Cities for HTS 2022/23 data has also been included in this release on 15 May 2025. If you have downloaded HTS 2022/23 data by LGA and/or Six Cities from this link prior to 15/05/2025, we advise you replace it with the revised tables. If you have been supplied bespoke data tables for 2022/23 LGAs and/or Six Cities, please request updated tables.\r \r Revisions to HTS data may be made on previously published data as new sample data is appended to improve reliability of results. Please check this page for release dates to ensure you are using the most current version or create a subscription (https://opendata.transport.nsw.gov.au/subscriptions) to be notified of revisions and future releases.\r

People often use different modes of transport at various times for a range of reasons, so it is important that we continue to listen to how people in NSW rate their experiences throughout their entire journey.

Conducting the ‘Customer Satisfaction Index’ helps us gain insight into the experiences of our transport users, which helps us focus our efforts on improving transport services to meet the needs of NSW residents.

We would like to thank the more than 34,000 people who provided their feedback, either online or face-to-face, for the most recent research, conducted in May 2024.

Public Transport in NSW

Passengers impacted by disruptions due to adverse weather.

Severe adverse weather events in early 2024 affected our public transport passengers, resulting in a slight decline in satisfaction with train timeliness. However, satisfaction with the ‘availability of information about service delays’ has slightly increased compared with six months ago.

As preparation continued during May for the new Sydney Metro expansion, passengers were kept well informed to what to expect with changes to services. Consequently, passengers have remained highly satisfied, particularly with the ‘knowledge of staff’ and ‘information about delays’.

As public transport patronage continued to increase, satisfaction levels for comfort and ‘personal space’ have slightly decreased for buses, light rail and ferries.

Road

Severe weather in early 2024 also impacted road users in NSW, leading to a decline in satisfaction with journey time reliability for private vehicles and motorcycles across the state.

Heavy vehicle users have previously reported low satisfaction with rest areas across NSW. We have been focusing on improving these facilities, and it’s encouraging to see that satisfaction levels have continued to rise.

Active transport users remain highly satisfied, with cyclists increasingly pleased with the ‘ease of connecting to public transport’ and pedestrians appreciating ‘sharing footpaths with others safely’.

Point-to-Point

Satisfaction among users of point-to-point services (taxis, rideshares and hire cars) remains stable overall, with customers most satisfied with their accessibility and convenience.

What’s Next

We will continue engaging with our passengers to gain deeper insights into their experiences across NSW’s transport network. This feedback will guide us in prioritising areas of low and declining satisfaction, helping us work towards delivering a consistently positive experience throughout their journey.

TPA provides projections of workforce, employment, and population at Travel Zone level for the Sydney Greater Metropolitan Area (GMA).

The Transport Performance and Analytics (TPA) produces travel forecasts using the Strategic Travel Model (STM). This model is a world class tool that projects travel patterns in the Sydney Greater Metropolitan Area under different land use, transport and pricing scenarios. It can be used to test alternative settlement, employment and transport policies, to identify likely future capacity constraints, or to determine potential usage levels of proposed new transport infrastructure or services.

The STM is built largely in the EMME transport modelling software. It is comprised of a series of models and processes that attempt to replicate, in a simplified manner, people’s travel choices and behaviour under a given scenario. The STM combines our understanding of travel behaviour with likely population and employment size and distribution, and likely road and public transport networks and services to estimate future travel under different strategic land use and transport scenarios.

The STM produces travel forecasts by origin (2,690) and destination (2,690) STM zones for:

• The Sydney Greater Metropolitan Area which includes the Sydney Statistical Division, Newcastle Statistical Subdivision and Illawarra Statistical Division.

• 5 yearly intervals from the latest Census year up to a 35-year horizon

• 9 travel modes: Car driver, Car passenger, Rail, Bus, Light rail, Ferry, Bike, Walk and Taxi

• 7 purposes: Work, Business, Primary/Secondary/Tertiary education, Shopping, Other

• 24 hour, average workday (Monday to Friday excluding public holidays)

• am/pm peak, interpeak and evening travel