An old electrical substation at Sutherland has been reborn as a new museum for heritage rail and tramway items.
Sydney Trains restored the building at a cost of $2 million and has handed it over for inclusion in Sydney Tramway Museum at Loftus.
Among items on permanent display will be a recently decommissioned wooden escalator from Town Hall station.
The substation, which is entered from Rawson Avenue (Old Princes Highway) just south of the rail overpass, was built for the electrification of the rail network in the 1920s.
It was derelict for several years after being replaced by a new outdoor substation.
Transport Minister Andrew Constance unveiled a plaque to officially open the new facility on Tuesday.
An announcement has not yet been made on when the substation museum will open to the public.
Heathcote MP Lee Evans said it would be a new historical attraction for the area.
“Visitors to the Sydney Tramway Museum will soon get the chance to explore this wonderfully restored substation, filled with impressive train and tramway history,” he said.
Sydney Tramway Museum chairman, Howard Clark, said his organisation had been looking for a suitable space since it lost its storage shed to fire in 2015.
“We have a number of historical items in our possession and needed a space that was safe and secure and the substation provides that element for us,” Mr Clark said.
“The substation is perfect for our expanding requirements as it is just up the road from our current base and is on the tram line.”
Sydney Tramway Museum said on its website the contractors carrying out the restoration also reconstructed the old Cremorne tram waiting shed, which the museum had held in “kit form” for some years, next to the Waratah Loop.
“For various reasons the new waiting shed is more a replica than a restoration,” the museum said.
The NSW Office of Environment and Heritage (OEH) says the Sutherland Substation is of local heritage significance as a part of the infrastructure required to establish the electrification of the metropolitan railway network in the 1920s.
“The structure is also significant as a good representative example of the standard style of railway substation built in suburban areas between the 1920-30s, the structure retaining all important design features of this type of railway building,” OEH says.
“The substation also has aesthetic value, with the quality of its design reflecting the desire by the railways to showcase a new era of technology with the introduction of an electric system.”