Hunter Valley Happenings

["Alex Pout" <alpout@optusnet.com.au>]

Morning all,
A couple of things that may be of interest.

Firstly, the Mayor of Maitland, Peter Blackmore, has called for the
electrification of the Hunter Valley lines to be done as the "social bonus"
for the region from the sale of Freightcorp.  From my perspective, it makes
sense, and should have been done a long time ago.  Who knows, electrifying
the line could either justify keeping the line all the way into Newcastle,
or expedite its removal.  Either way, it would allow direct  services
between the Hunter and Central Coast Lines, improving the railway access to
the uni, in particular from the Western side of Lake Macquarie.

And on other news, a woman was killed and another one put into hospital in a
serious condition when their car was hit by a train just outside Dungog last
night.  Don't have any more details, apart from what was in the paper, but
the photo on the front page showed the car impaled on a post and rail fence,
and the train stopped on the line about 50m from the crossing.

Al