Railway Digest Magazine July 2017 Back Issue

The NSW Hunter Valley
The Hunter Valley Coal Chain is the largest export operation in the world, but there’s even more to this busy network than a coal train passing very few minutes. We present a selection of recent images taken along this extraordinarily busy corridor.

A visit to the West Coast Wilderness Railway
When an old friend of Shane O’Neil’s happened to celebrate his 60th birthday while on contract as a steam driver at Tasmania’s famous West Coast Wilderness Railway, it provided the perfect excuse to fly down and take a good look at the current operations there.

Cunningar
On 7 December 2015, GrainCorp announced that, as part of its Project Regeneration, the Cunningar Grain Receival site, just north of Harden on the NSW Main South, would be upgraded at a total cost of $8.1 million. As a regular visitor to the site, Buck Rogers has been monitoring the progress at Cunningar, and provides a timely update.

Data and the internet of trains
Making transportation work means not just focusing on cars, trams and trains themselves, but on the systems that make sure that there’s safety, power, and communication around all the movement of every transportation unit. Rail is especially important: It would be hard to imagine a big city operating efficiently without a functional rail system. Beyond the rolling stock and infrastructure, the answer lies in data specialists who monitor and analyse the billions of data points that a train sends out every year. Gerhard Kress, Global Head of Data Services, Siemens Mobility, has some interesting thoughts on the matter.

Finding the right innovation in Australia’s rail industry
The Department of Infrastructure and Regional Development expects the rail freight task in Australia to double over the next 20 years, bringing huge opportunities, but also challenges, for the industry. Martin Chappell, of Motorola Solutions, has some ideas on how technology and innovation can play a major role in the future