City Rail Link opening date revealed as 13 September

Thirty-nine days.The opening date for Auckland's City Rail Link has been revealed as Sunday, 13 September, 39 days away.An Auckland Transport billboard on Fanshawe Street seen early Thursday morning announced the date.It comes hours before Auckland mayor Wayne Brown and Transport Minister Chris Bishop were due to make an announcement about the project.The $5.5 billion CRL is New Zealand's largest transportation infrastructure project, and construction has been going on for the past 10 years.Until now, its opening date had been kept tighting under wraps, with Auckland councillor Richard Hills earlier saying people were getting frustrated."Is there any way in the next couple of days that it can be announced what month? Because there are a lot of people getting upset, concerned. There's a lot of businesses who just want hope."CRL open daysAuckland Transport, City Rail Link Limited and KiwiRail will be opening the new stations to the public through a series of 'First Look' events. These will be free, ticketed sessions, but numbers will be limited.They will be held over consecutive Saturdays in August: 8 August - First Look at Maungawhau, 15 August - First Look at Karanga-a-Hape, 22 August - First Look at Te Waihorotiu.The free tickets for these will be available one week ahead of each event.At peak, trains will run every five minutes through the city centre and on average around 10 minutes elsewhere on the network. At off-peak the new lines will operate every 15 minutes throughout the day, including weekends, compared with every 20 minutes at present.Auckland's City Rail Link opens on 13 September.RNZ / Irra Lee