Railway Digest Magazine March 2021 Back Issue

I waited 53 years for a seven-minute train ride
John Kirk was one of first students at Adelaide’s Flinders University in 1967, and each day he caught the train from his local station at Woodlands Park to the terminus at Tonsley, where either the university shuttle bus or fellow students with cars ferried the train travellers to the nearby Uni campus. The Tonsley line had opened the year before, its main purpose being to serve the passenger and freight needs of the Chrysler factory there, and as the area developed, there were several plans and many promises over the years to extend the line beyond Tonsley. However, it was not until Tuesday 29 December 2020 that the first scheduled service arrived at the new Flinders station!

Last train to Bairnsdale
David Campbell transferred from Metro to V/Line some years ago and this saw him eventually qualify to drive to Bairnsdale, a town he had strong associations with going back to his childhood. More recently, a move to a regional area meant a transfer well away from Melbourne, a new roster and no more runs to Bairnsdale. However, during the last month or so before he finally made the move, he managed to fluke a few final trips. On the last of these he was without a trainee, so could really take a chance to enjoy his ‘Last train to Bairnsdale’.

Hunter Heat
A collision of circumstances occurred over the last weekend of November 2020 such as had not been seen in many a long year – Chris Walters and two close friends were all in Sydney at the same time and allowed out of the house! Despite an unexpected heatwave, they hit the M1 bound for the NSW lower Hunter valley, with a shared desire to check out the very busy and ever-changing railway scene in and around Newcastle.