Re: Interstate Platform at Seymour

[dbromage@fang.omni.com.au (David Bromage)]

Grahame Ferguson (grahamef@users.mcmedia.com.au) wrote:
> 1.Platform Size- Orange East Fork is no more than a half a car length long,
> yet the 14 car Indian Pacific stops there.

Always, or only if required?

> 2. I f you want to run the XPT express- eliminate Moss Vale, Gunning,Yerong
> Creek, The Rock, Henty, Uranquinty, Culcairn.  Their combined population
> does not even equal Seymour's.

Moss Vale should be retained as a stop. There are several road coach
connections there, e.g. from Wollongong. It's also a convenient transfer
point from CityRail trains.

For the other stations, the XPT is their ONLY rail service. Not every
train stops at every location every day, so having conditional stops is
not a problem.

> 5. From a cost point of view- eliminate the BG north of Seymour  lay
> concrete sleepers with 60kg rail (this would increase train speeds)and then
> convert 2 N sets to supplement to become an all stops Melbourne to Albury
> train.  Only Euroa and Wodonga would need an SG platform.

My preferred option would be to regauge the existing bg line with
crossovers so the existing platforms could be used.

> 6. It still costs nothing to stop the XPT at Seymour.

A bit of extra fuel from the acceleration. :)

The problem is that the XPT is not being used for the job it was designed
for. Far from being a limited express, it has to be a local train because
in most cases it is the only train. If you look at the original Riverina
XPT, it only stopped at the major stations (Albury to Wagga in 59 minutes!)
and the smaller stations were served by the South Mail.

Back to my pet project, if there was a 12.14 Albury/Griffith Xplorer
ex-Sydney, then ST3 could become a real limited express again and do the
trip in about 10 hours.

Cheers
David