OSPIPO
Shoalhaven · both directions
Sydney Airport to Nowra. $510.
Nowra is the regional centre of the Shoalhaven and it sits on the south bank of the river, which is what separates it from Bomaderry and from Bomaderry's fare. The run is $510 in either direction, fixed at booking.
- Fixed fare
- $510
- both directions, all-inclusive
- Distance
- 145 km
- by road, M1 and the Princes Highway
- Typical drive
- 2h 05m
- 2 hours 5 minutes outside peak
Your fixed fare
Available- Base fare $60.00
- Distance145 km at $3.30/km $478.50
- NSW Passenger Service Levy $1.32
- Motorway tolls included
- Airport pickup and parking included
- Meet and greet inside the terminal included
- GST (10%) included
- Published corridor farecapped below the formula −$29.82
Booking lodged
The arithmetic
The arithmetic, itemised.
One way and return. A Nowra return is $920 — the one-way doubled, ten percent off the second leg, rounded to the nearest $5, and agreed before the first leg runs.
- Base fare $60.00
- Distance145 km at $3.30/km $478.50
- NSW Passenger Service Levy $1.32
- Motorway tolls included
- Airport pickup and parking included
- Meet and greet inside the terminal included
- GST (10%) included
- Published corridor farecapped below the formula −$29.82
- Base fare $60.00
- Distance145 km at $3.30/km $478.50
- NSW Passenger Service Levy $1.32
- Motorway tolls included
- Airport pickup and parking included
- Meet and greet inside the terminal included
- GST (10%) included
- Published corridor farecapped below the formula −$29.82
- One-way fixed total $510.00
- Return legsame chauffeur, same car $510.00
- Return discount10% off the doubled fare −$102.00
- Rounded to the nearest $5 $2.00
The published fare and the formula are both printed because they differ here, and the published $510 is the lower of the two. On a run of this length that gap is worth showing rather than quietly keeping.
What the fare covers
Included, and not.
Inside the published fare
- Every motorway toll on the route
- GST
- The NSW Passenger Service Levy
- Airport access and parking
- Meet and greet inside the terminal with a name sign
- Help with your bags at both ends
- Flight tracking, with the pickup moved to the actual landing time
- Two hours of waiting on international arrivals, one hour on domestic
- Child seats, fitted and checked, on request
- Bottled water and a phone charger at every seat
Not included, and never quietly added
- Meals, and any stop long enough to eat one
- Extra waiting beyond the free allowance, charged at the hourly rate agreed at booking
- Additional stops not named at booking
- Parking or entry fees at a private venue that charges them
- Anything the car physically cannot carry — see the capacity note
Departure timing
When the car has to be at your door.
Worked backwards from the flight, not forwards from a guess. Every row uses the same 125-minute drive time published at the top of this page.
| Flight departs | Terminal | Be at the airport | Pick-up |
|---|---|---|---|
| 06:00 domestic | T2 / T3 | 04:00 | 01:45 |
| 07:00 international | T1 | 04:00 | 01:45 |
| 08:00 domestic | T2 / T3 | 06:00 | 03:45 |
| 09:30 international | T1 | 06:30 | 03:55 |
| 13:00 domestic | T2 / T3 | 11:00 | 08:25 |
| 17:00 international | T1 | 14:00 | 11:45 |
| 21:00 domestic | T2 / T3 | 19:00 | 16:45 |
Worked from 125 minutes of driving, plus 10 minutes to load at the kerb, plus 3 hours inside the terminal for an international departure and 2 hours for a domestic one. A 20-minute allowance is added where the drive runs through the morning peak. Arriving instead of departing? Then none of this applies: give the flight number and the pickup moves to the actual landing time, with 2 hours free at T1 and 1 hour at T2 and T3.
The corridor
Two hours, and the river.
The first half is the standard South Coast run: the Shire, the Royal National Park, Mount Ousley into the Illawarra, then the open highway past Shellharbour, Gerringong and the Berry bypass.
From Berry south the road is dual carriageway all the way to the river, which is a recent enough change that plenty of published drive times for this route are still wrong. The one at the top of this page is not.
The Shoalhaven River is the event. Every vehicle heading south crosses at the same place, and for decades that crossing was the whole town's afternoon. The four-lane bridge that opened in 2023 took the queue out of it, and a river crossing that used to be a coin toss is now a minute.
Nowra sits above the south bank. The CBD is a compact grid around Junction and Kinghorne Streets, the hospital is out on Scenic Drive, and the road west runs to the naval air station at Nowra Hill. Local peak on the bridge approaches still exists between 07:00 and 09:00 and again from 16:00, and it costs ten minutes rather than the trip.
HMAS Albatross is the largest naval air station in the country and it generates a particular kind of booking: postings, courses, families arriving and leaving on short notice, and weekend rotations that start before dawn. The car meets you at the main gate unless a pass has been arranged in advance, because a visitor pass is the base's decision and not the chauffeur's.
Beyond the town the river villages each carry their own published fare rather than being folded into this one — Culburra Beach at $539, Greenwell Point and Terara quoted to the address. The old site claimed the Nowra fare covered all of them, which was not true and made the cheaper ones look expensive.
Weekday peak on the bridge approaches
Between 07:00 and 09:00 and again from about 16:00, the approaches to the crossing and the Bridge Road end of town slow down. It is ten minutes, and the pickup time is set with it included.
Gate queues at HMAS Albatross
Visitor processing at the main gate is unpredictable and outside anyone's control here. Standard practice is to meet at the gate rather than inside, which removes the variable entirely.
December and January southbound
The corridor carries the whole coast's holiday traffic through Nowra towards Jervis Bay and Ulladulla. Add twenty minutes on the Saturday at either end of the school holidays.
Hospital appointments
A run to a Sydney specialist and back is priced as a round trip with waiting included rather than as two separate fares. See the medical transfer page for how the waiting is handled.
Pick-up
Where the car waits in Nowra.
Named entrances rather than a suburb. An entrance that is not listed is still collected — this list exists to save a phone call at 03:00.
Shoalhaven District Memorial Hospital, Scenic Drive
The main entrance rather than emergency. For an appointment in Sydney the trip is priced as a round trip with waiting included, not as two one-way fares.
HMAS Albatross main gate, Nowra Hill
The car waits at the gate unless a visitor pass has been arranged in advance. Give the passenger's name at booking and the pickup is straightforward at any hour.
Junction Street and the Nowra CBD
The compact grid above the south bank. A CBD pickup is kerbside; say which side of the street if you are on the hill, because the bags travel downhill better than up.
Shoalhaven Entertainment Centre, Bridge Road
For an early departure after a show or a conference. The forecourt works at night and the car does not need the car park.
Worrigee, Mundamia and South Nowra
The newer residential estates south and east of the centre. Street numbering is clear, but several courts share a name — the full address at booking removes the guess.
Terara and the riverfront
The flats east of the town along the south bank. Fog sits here on winter mornings, which is worth ten minutes rather than a phone call.
Honestly compared
Against the alternatives, honestly.
Nowra has no railway station of its own, which changes what an honest comparison can even offer. The nearest platform is across the river at Bomaderry.
| Option | What it costs | Roughly | The catch |
|---|---|---|---|
| OSPIPO chauffeur | $510 fixed | 2h 5m | One car and one chauffeur. On a school-holiday Saturday the diary fills weeks out. |
| Train to Bomaderry, then a lift | An Opal fare plus $17.92 | 3h 30m or more | Much the cheapest option and the most fragile. Two changes, a diesel railcar south of Kiama, and a river crossing at the end that the train does not make — somebody has to collect you from Bomaderry. |
| Rideshare | Variable, surges | 2h 5m | At this distance the problem is acceptance, not price. A 145 km job leaving the airport at 02:00 is the one that sits unaccepted and then cancels. |
| Metered taxi | Not knowable in advance | 2h 5m | Two hours of meter, plus waiting, plus tolls and the airport charge at the end. The number arrives after the journey does, which on this run is a long time to wonder. |
| Drive and park | $51.00 to $62.00 a day | 2h 5m each way | Four hours of driving around the flight, at both ends. Over a two-week trip the parking alone exceeds the return fare, and you still do the driving. |
If somebody can meet the train at Bomaderry and you are not flying early, the rail option is a fraction of this and there is no argument against it. If you are landing at 23:40, or leaving Nowra Hill at 02:30 with a posting to make, the case for $510 is that the number and the car were settled yesterday.
Nearby
Around the Shoalhaven.
Also collected from
This route
Questions about this run.
The river. Bomaderry is on the north bank and the highway reaches it first; Nowra is on the south bank and the crossing sits between them. Eleven dollars of road distance.
The fare that applies is the one published for the suburb the driveway is in. The old site claimed at various points that Bomaderry was $480, $499 and $510, and this page exists partly to stop that.
Yes, from the main entrance on Scenic Drive rather than emergency, in both directions, at the fixed $510 each way. A Sydney specialist appointment is priced as one round trip at $920, waiting through a typical appointment of up to 4 hours included, rather than 2 separate fares. If the appointment moves, cancellation is free at any time before pickup and no card details were taken. What this car is not is patient transport: no clinical care, no stretcher, and you will be told so rather than booked.
The car meets you at the main gate at Nowra Hill unless the base has issued a visitor pass in advance. Access to the station is the Navy's decision, not the chauffeur's, and a gate queue at 04:00 is not something to build a flight around.
Postings, courses and weekend rotations are regular work on this route, and the fare is the same $510 whatever the hour of the movement.
No. 3 adults, 2 large checked suitcases and 3 carry-on bags is the whole capacity of one sedan, and a posting's worth of boxes is well past it. A relocation is a removalist's job. Book the removalist for the boxes and this car for the people at the fixed $510, tolls and GST included. Say what you are carrying at booking and it is sorted then rather than at the kerb at 04:00.
Yes, at their own published fares rather than folded into this one. Culburra Beach is $539. Greenwell Point, Terara and Pyree are quoted to the address.
The previous version of this page said the Nowra fare covered all of them, which was not true and made the shorter runs look dearer than they are.
No. The South Coast Line stops at Bomaderry on the north bank and the river sits between that platform and the town, so every rail journey here finishes by road. South of Kiama the line is not electrified either, so it is a diesel railcar plus 2 changes, at Wolli Creek and again at Kiama, and somebody still has to meet you at Bomaderry and drive the last leg across.
Yes. The four-lane crossing that opened in 2023 removed the afternoon queue that used to define this town's traffic, and the drive time published at the top of this page assumes the new bridge rather than the old one.
What is left is ordinary local peak on the approaches between 07:00 and 09:00 and from about 16:00, which is worth ten minutes.
$564, fixed, covering the Opera House, Circular Quay, Barangaroo, Martin Place and every other CBD address.
Beyond the CBD zone — Parramatta, Olympic Park, a hospital in the north-west — the fare is the CBD figure plus the published per-kilometre rate for the extra distance, quoted before you commit to anything.
No question matches that. Try a shorter word, or ask the concierge.
Book it
$510 each way. Settled.
Two addresses, a date and a time. The receipt is on screen before a name is typed, and no card details are taken at any stage.
Your fixed fare
Available- Base fare $60.00
- Distance145 km at $3.30/km $478.50
- NSW Passenger Service Levy $1.32
- Motorway tolls included
- Airport pickup and parking included
- Meet and greet inside the terminal included
- GST (10%) included
- Published corridor farecapped below the formula −$29.82
Booking lodged