Trans-Australian Railway

Port Augusta-Kalgoorlie-Boulder
Gauge :	1435 mm ( standard gauge )
Legend from Broken Hill and Sydney 0 Port Augusta after Whyalla 28 Tent Hill 55 Hesso 85 Bookaloo 118 McLeay 150 Chaos 181 Pimba to Woomera 219 Burando 250 Wirraminna 283 Coondambo 302 Kultanby 335 Kingoonya 377 Ferguson 413 Tarcoola Central Australian Railroad   to / from Alice Springs and Darwin 450 Malbooma 473 Lyons 515 Wynbring 546 Mount Christie 575 Mungala 602 Barton 634 Bates 684 Ooldea 717 Watson O'Malley 770 Fisher 823 cook Denman Hughes Western Australia / South Australia border Deakin Reid Forrest Oral rabilla Loongana Nurina Haig Wilban Rawlinna Naretha 913 913 mile Boonderoo Kitchener Zanthus Coonana Chifley Carony Randell Kalgoorlie Boulder to Perth

The Trans- Australian Railroad is a single-track, standard-gauge railway line, completed in 1917, which connects Western Australia with New South Wales . The core route runs from Kalgoorlie to Port Augusta . At both ends, the railway connects to other railways, so that in a broader sense the name Transaustralian Railway is also used for the entire west-east-oriented connection Perth - Sydney .

topography

Stop on the Indian Pacific in the Nullarbor Desert

The tea and sugar at a stop on the way

The railway line crosses the Nullarbor Desert , a terrain with almost no incline. Here, between km 797 and km 1275, is the longest straight railroad in the world, at 478 km. The total length of the route between Kalgoorlie and Port Augusta is 1,692.6 km.

The route does not cross fresh water. In order to supply staff and steam locomotives with water, groundwater was drilled at large intervals and reservoirs were created.

history

In 1901 the six previously autonomous Australian colonies merged to form the state of Australia . The condition for the accession of Western Australia was the promise that the federal government would build a railway that would connect the settlement center of the colony around its capital Perth, which is isolated from the rest of the country, with the other settlement centers of the new state in the south and east of the continent.

In 1907 the legal basis was created for prospecting the course of the route. This work was completed in 1909. The result was a route proposal between the ends of the West Australian Railway in Kalgoorlie and the South Australian Railway in Port Augusta. The Railway Construction Act was passed in 1911 and the Commonwealth Railways was founded in 1912 to carry out construction and subsequent operations. The work began in September 1912 and was carried out in standard gauge, although the railways that connected at both ends at that time were in Cape gauge . Construction has started from both ends, and he was also, despite Australia's entry into the First World War led on. The two construction crews met in October 1917 and the track ends were connected on October 17, 1917. The construction cost 4,045,000 pounds sterling .

In 1937 the eastern end of the line was extended to Port Pirie . This saved the passengers in the direction of Adelaide from having to change to the Cape Gauge connection between Port Augusta and Terowie via Quorn and Peterborough through the Flinders Ranges . You could now switch directly to the South Australian broad gauge (1600 mm). It saved passengers going to Sydney at least the slow journey through the Flinders Ranges. At the same time, three gauges met at the Port Pirie station.

Only in 1970, after a gap had been closed at Broken Hill, did a continuous track in standard gauge coming from New South Wales reach Perth and for the first time enabled continuous trains between Perth and Sydney . In Broken Hill, a plaque at the station commemorates February 23, 1970 - the day the gap was closed - as well as numerous vehicles of the former Silverton Tramway, which are brought together in a museum.

business

The Trans- Australian Railroad is an important freight link between Western Australia and the eastern Australian states. Passenger traffic, on the other hand, is rather insignificant and primarily of a tourist nature: the Indian Pacific travels the entire length of the route, the Ghan uses it between Port Augusta and Tarcoola . The passenger train service originally operated under the name Trans-Australian . Even during the construction of the line until 1996, the Tea and Sugar Train was also running, supplying the isolated railway employees and towns along the line with everyday goods.

The water found by drilling was often salty and neither suitable for drinking nor for the locomotives. The trains had to carry their water supply with them. In the days of the steam locomotive, this meant that the water made up half of the tonnage carried. The problem was known from the beginning and the first chief engineer, Henry Deane, was already trying to prepare for the use of diesel locomotives . Before this proposal could gain a foothold, however, he had to resign because of a procurement scandal. The successor relied on steam locomotives again. So it was only from 1951 onwards that diesel locomotives were used as scheduled on the route.

Originally, the line was provided with a 400 meter long siding about every 100 kilometers so that train crossings were possible. With increasing traffic, these possibilities have increased and expanded. Since 2008, all passing points have been able to accommodate trains up to 1800 meters in length and are arranged along the route at intervals of between 30 km and 60 km. Most of these alternative positions are vacant. They are equipped with fallback switches and, if necessary, are set remotely by the train crew via radio. There are no signals . The safety is guaranteed by driving commands .

Crossing Australia by train

Color code
Cape Track	Standard gauge	Broad gauge

1917-1927

Route section	train	operator	length	annotation
Perth - Kalgoorlie	The Westland	Western Australian Government Railways
Kalgoorlie - Port Augusta	Trans-Australian	Commonwealth Railways	1693 km
Port Augusta - Terowie		South Australian Railway , from 1926: Commonwealth Railways
Terowie - Adelaide		South Australian Railway
Adelaide - Melbourne	The Overland	South Australian Railway, Victoria Railways
Melbourne - Albury		Victoria Railways
Albury - Sydney		New South Wales Railways

1927-1937

Route section	train	operator	length	annotation
Perth - Kalgoorlie	The Westland	Western Australian Government Railways
Kalgoorlie - Port Augusta	Trans-Australian	Commonwealth Railways	1693 km
Port Augusta - Broken Hill		South Australian Railways / Silverton Tramway		Silverton Tramway on the Cockburn - Broken Hill section (56 km)
Broken Hill - Sydney		New South Wales Railways

1937-1968

Route section	train	operator	length	annotation
Perth - Kalgoorlie	The Westland	Western Australian Government Railways
Kalgoorlie - Port Pirie	Trans-Australian	Commonwealth Railways
Port Pirie - Broken Hill		South Australian Railways / Silverton Tramway		Silverton Tramway on the Cockburn - Broken Hill section (56 km)
Broken Hill - Sydney		New South Wales Railways

1968-1970

Route section	train	operator	length	annotation
Perth - Port Pirie	Trans-Australian	Western Australian Government Railways / Commonwealth Railways
Port Pirie - Broken Hill		South Australian Railways / Silverton Tramway		Silverton Tramway on the Cockburn - Broken Hill section (56 km)
Broken Hill - Sydney		New South Wales Railways

Since 1970

Route section	train	operator	length	annotation
Perth - Sydney	Indian Pacific	today: Great Southern Railway	3,962 km (direct route)	4,352 km with a detour via Adelaide

literature

• Patsy Adam-Smith: The desert railway . Adelaide 1974, ISBN 0851796753 .
• J .L. Buckland: Canadian and American Locomotives in Wartime Service on the Trans-Australian Railway . In: Australian Railway Historical Society Bulletin, September 1965.
• A. Burke: Rails through the Wilderness . New South Wales University Press 1991.
• David Burke: Road through the wilderness: The story of the transcontinental railway, the first great work of Australia's federation . Kensington, NSW 1991, ISBN 0868401404 .
• TF Chambers: The Golden Jubilee of the Trans Australian Railway . In: Australian Railway Historical Society Bulletin, November 1968, pp. 267-275.
• CH Henshaw: Overland to Perth in 1928 . In: Australian Railway Historical Society Bulletin, April, 1964.
• NN: Rail Journeys of Australia . South Pacific Maps Pty. Ltd., Brisbane 2007.

Web links

• Australian Bureau of Statistics article on federal railways
• Australian Rail Track Corporation map ( Memento from July 20, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF file; 646 kB)