The Ghan is an experiential tourism oriented passenger train service that operates between the northern and southern coasts of Australia, through the cities of Adelaide, Alice Springs and Darwin on the Adelaide–Darwin rail corridor. Operated by Journey Beyond Rail Expeditions, its scheduled travelling time, including extended stops for passengers to do off-train tours, is 53 hours 15 minutes to travel the 2,979 kilometres (1,851 mi). The Ghan has been described as one of the world's great passenger trains.
The Indian Pacific is a weekly experiential tourism passenger train service that runs in Australia's east–west rail corridor between Sydney, on the shore of the Pacific Ocean, and Perth, on the shore of the Indian Ocean – thus, like its counterpart in the north–south corridor, The Ghan, one of the few truly transcontinental trains in the world. It first ran in 1970 after the completion of gauge conversion projects in South Australia and Western Australia, enabling for the first time a cross-continental rail journey that did not have a break of gauge.
Rail transport in Australia is a component of the Australian transport system. It is to a large extent state-based, as each state largely has its own operations, with the interstate network being developed ever since federation. As of 2022, the Australian rail network consists of a total of 32,929 kilometres (20,461 mi) of track built to three major track gauges: 18,007 kilometres (11,189 mi) of standard gauge, 2,685 kilometres (1,668 mi) of broad gauge, and 11,914 kilometres (7,403 mi) of narrow gauge lines. Additionally, about 1,400 kilometres (870 mi) of 610 mm / 2 ft gauge lines support the sugar-cane industry. 3,488 kilometres (2,167 mi), around 11 per cent of the Australian heavy railways network route-kilometres are electrified.
The rail network in Adelaide, South Australia, consists of four lines and 89 stations, totalling 132 km. It is operated by Keolis Downer under contract from the Government of South Australia, and is part of the citywide Adelaide Metro public transport system.
Australians generally assumed in the 1850s that railways would be built by the private sector. Private companies built railways in the then colonies of Victoria, opened in 1854, and New South Wales, where the company was taken over by the government before completion in 1855, due to bankruptcy. South Australia's railways were government owned from the beginning, including a horse-drawn line opened in 1854 and a steam-powered line opened in 1856. In Victoria, the private railways were soon found not to be financially viable, and existing rail networks and their expansion were taken over by the colony. Government ownership also enabled railways to be built to promote development, even if not apparently viable in strictly financial terms. The railway systems spread from the colonial capitals, except in cases where geography dictated a choice of an alternate port.
The Prospector is a rural passenger train service in Western Australia operated by Transwa between East Perth and Kalgoorlie. On this service, two trains depart almost at the same time in opposite directions, one travelling between East Perth and Kalgoorlie, and the other between Kalgoorlie and East Perth. The original vehicles ordered in 1968 for trains providing this service were replaced in 2004 with vehicles capable of reducing journey times to 6 hours 45 minutes.
The Australind is a rural passenger train service in Western Australia operated by Transwa on the South Western Railway between Perth and Bunbury.
The Trans-Australian Railway, opened in 1917, runs from Port Augusta in South Australia to Kalgoorlie in Western Australia, crossing the Nullarbor Plain in the process. As the only rail freight corridor between Western Australia and the eastern states, the line is strategically important. The railway includes the world's longest section of completely straight track.
The Eastern Goldfields Railway was built in the 1890s by the Western Australian Government Railways to connect Perth with the Eastern Goldfields at Coolgardie and Kalgoorlie.
The Westland was the name given in 1938 to the overnight train operated by the Western Australian Government Railways (WAGR) with sitting and sleeping cars between Perth and Kalgoorlie, where it connected with the Trans-Australian service to Adelaide.
The Commonwealth Railways were established in 1917 by the Government of Australia with the Commonwealth Railways Act to administer the Trans-Australia and Port Augusta to Darwin railways. It was absorbed into Australian National in 1975.
South Australian Railways (SAR) was the statutory corporation through which the Government of South Australia built and operated railways in South Australia from 1854 until March 1978, when its non-urban railways were incorporated into Australian National, and its Adelaide urban lines were transferred to the State Transport Authority.
Railways in Western Australia were developed in the 19th century both by the Government of Western Australia and a number of private companies. Today passenger rail services are controlled by the Public Transport Authority through Transperth, which operates public transport in Perth, and Transwa, which operates country passenger services. Great Southern Rail operates the Indian Pacific.
The ADK class are a class of diesel multiple units that were previously operated by Western Australian Government Railways (WAGR) in Perth, and later Transdev Auckland on Auckland's suburban rail network, and are currently operated by MetroBus in Maputo, Mozambique. Originally built by Commonwealth Engineering and the Midland Railway Workshops for WAGR in the late 1960s, all but one were sold in 1993 to New Zealand Rail, and were then owned by Auckland Transport. The units were completely withdrawn from service on 5 December 2014, following completion of electrification of Auckland's network.
The Silverton Tramway was a 58-kilometre-long 1,067 mm railway line running from Cockburn on the South Australian state border to Broken Hill in New South Wales. Operating between 1888 and 1970, it served the mines in Broken Hill, and formed the link between the 1,435 mmstandard gauge New South Wales Government Railways and the narrow gauge South Australian Railways lines. It was owned and operated by the Silverton Tramway Company (STC).
The Sydney–Perth rail corridor is a 1435 mmstandard gauge railway route that runs for 4352 kilometres (2704 mi) across Australia from Sydney, New South Wales, to Perth, Western Australia. Most of the route is under the control of the Australian Rail Track Corporation.
The CL class is a class of diesel locomotives built by Clyde Engineering, Granville for the Commonwealth Railways in several batches between 1970 and 1972. The class was the last in the world to be built with the Electro-Motive Diesel bulldog nose but differed from previous builds in having a mansard roof.
The Commonwealth Railways G class was a class of twenty-six 4-6-0 tender locomotives of the Commonwealth Railways, Australia. The class operated between Port Augusta and Kalgoorlie on the 1435 mm Trans-Australian Railway.
Port Augusta railway station is a rail station located on the Adelaide-Port Augusta railway line in Port Augusta, South Australia.
Port Pirie railway station was the fifth of six stations that operated at various times from 1876 to serve the small maritime town of Port Pirie, 216 kilometres by rail north of Adelaide, South Australia. As with several of Port Pirie's other stations before it, the station was built to accommodate a change of track gauge on railway lines leading into the town.
The Trans-Australian in 1924
The Trans-Australian in 1938
The Trans-Australian in 1951
Poster advertising the Trans-Australian about 1940
Post-war poster advertising the Trans-Australian in the final years of steam traction
Poster advertising the introduction of diesel locomotives for the Trans-Australian in 1951
