International Railroad Discussion > Australian Freight Volumes

I'm curious about freight train volumes Down Under. How many freight trains on a typical day would you see on the lines between:

1. Alice Springs and Darwin
2. Tarcoola Jct and Kalgoorie
3. Sydney and Broken Hill

Also, annual tonnage info if you have it.

Thank you. 

 

To start off with Australia only has a population of a little over 25 million, so does not have the population density to support an extensive rail freight industry

The routes that you enquired about are all open access, so anyone wishing to use them has to apply to ARTC (or GWA for Tarcoola-Darwin) for a path. In Australia any taxpayer basically has the right to operate their own trains over the open access network, between private sidings

Look for allocated paths here https://www.artc.com.au/customers/operations/mtp/2018-05-20/

Alice Springs to Darwin is over a line where Genesee & Wyoming Australia (GWA) are the open access controller
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genesee_%26_Wyoming_Australia

https://www.gwrr.com/




 



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/15/18 23:50 by jmt.

Very different than in the US. There is no loose car traffic. Generally trains are either intermodal or unit trains operated for a customer at the customers request. You need a way to know where a train is operating then stay with it. The exception is the coal trains of the Hunter Valley which is very busy and can be quite entertaining.
RWJ

yooperfan Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I'm curious about freight train volumes Down
> Under. How many freight trains on a typical day
> would you see on the lines between:
>
> 1. Alice Springs and Darwin
> 2. Tarcoola Jct and Kalgoorie
> 3. Sydney and Broken Hill
>
> Also, annual tonnage info if you have it.
>
> Thank you. 
>
>