The timeframe I was notified of for the phase2 switchover was 24-36 months (though that was 6 months ago). Given the expansion is still rolling along with radio replacements I'd be booking on around 24months (we don't have all the towers in here yet - Mid North Coast NSW). I've also been told that the controllers will remain P1 with only the voice channels going P2 for quite some time so that will create some interesting results.
Given how the south coast fires proved how crap the system is when things go wrong I'd have MUCH preferred they left it in the city where it's usefullness is.
I have a cheapie RT2832U hooked to an old laptop here running software that trunktracks P2, decodes to audio then sends back out via whichever program (Zello is working best atm since Discord changed something and now it's garbled when using it). This means I can load Zello on my phone to listen to it anywhere I can get mobile reception or WiFi.
In our cars I'll eventually have to upgrade my 996T to a P25 scanner of the same physical size and put a second of it in the mrs car (I like the 996P2's appearance but they're rare now).
Until you change to the GRN it won't be phase 2 you're using. Phase2 needs the repeater setup to be doing the timing amongst other things, is significantly extra cost and not warranted. So the best way I've found to find repeaters is to get my RTL which runs on the tv antenna and load SDR sharp on around 419 meg then watch for the peaks. Tune into them, find the ones with data noise and load DSD to see what it says about them. If it says it's a trunk channel I'll then close all the above and load UniTrunker to get the info off the tower.