Additional Train Services Between Sydney and Canberra

Well, Nathan is slapping his party into shape, so maybe he’ll fix State Wail next?

Upgrade the tracks? LOL!

The entire route needs to be axed. A new route can go from Canberra to Goulburn (or maybe Gunning) due north, which would cut an hour off the trip. They also need to do massive realignments from Douglas Park to Marulan. Keep the current route for local trains and build an express route vaguely following the Hume Highway for Countrylink and Freight.

If the Xploders could do their rated speed of 145km/h on a good alignment, you’d be in Sydney in a touch over two hours. The three sets of Xploder carriages they currently have assigned to Canberra could run a service every two hours in each direction.

You’d need to keep the section from Goulburn to Tarago open for Sydney’s garbage trains, but south of Tarago can then be mothballed.

It’s quite realistic to head up to Sydney and back by train if you have an afternoon appointment. Catch up on lots of work on a laptop till 11, 7 hours in Sydney and then back. Quite feasible – and much less stressful than the bus, and good for the environment. Thumbs up to Countrylink. It perhaps wasn’t clear from the timetable, though, how many of the services are actually trains …

Curiouser and interestinger. This could potentially do nice things to my CanberraSydney commuting budget — currently travelling one way each week. Keeping a cheaper, non-highway-touring-oriented bike in each city would save beans and let me get some work done on the train. Wouldn’t have to worry about being too tired to trek down the highway either. This has real potential

$15 for a bus that takes 3 hours against $48 for a trip almost 4.5 hours. My mother recently took the train to Sydney, she said she wouldn’t again due to how long it took and the scenery/paddocks weren’t that good to look at for that long.

I did hear recently it would be much quicker if the NSW Government upgraded the tracks between here and Goulburn so the trains could do a proper speed. Given their track record with anything, there’s no chance of that happening.

The Buffet service is very much still there. There’s one serving of a hot meal on board, hot and cold snacks, hot and cold beverages.

The new set up means you can take the train up in the morning and back in the evening four days a week. Not that I know why you’d want to.

Definitely worth 12.00. You can stand up and walk the length of the train to stretch your legs. Toilets in every carriage. I don’t know if they still have the little shop selling chocs and drinks.

You are more likely to find some empty seats to sit in. You will feel less sick reading the paper. The rural scenery is a heap better than the bus view of the freeway.

Does this new set-up mean you can now train up in the morning and back in the evening again?

I’ve taken both. The discounted fares on the bus are substantially cheaper than the train, but the train is relaxing, not nearly as crowded/cramped (even when the train is full), and you get a half decent meal, snack and beverage (inc licensed) service in the buffet car.

The scenery between Queanbeyan and the garbage sidings at Tarago is very pleasant. The train winds its way through the Molonglo Gorge at about 40km/h. At Tarago the speed goes up a level. At Goulburn it goes up another level. It’s a fairly quick run from there on.

The buses are a cattle operation in comparison. That lot packs you in with no personal space whatsoever, seal the door, and don’t open it for over three hours until you reach the other end.

Speaking of trains, I just booked a sleeping berth on the ARHS ACT New Years Eve trip to Sydney. It leaves 10am on the 31st getting to Sydney at 5pm, with lunch and snacks and an evening meal as you arrive into Sydney. You do your thing in Sydney, and then reboard the train anytime up until 2am, with champers. The train leaves at 2am, you retire to your sleeping berth, there’s breakfast served somewhere around Tarago at about 8am, and the train arrives in Canberra around 10am.

It’s pricey but it really seems worth it. I haven’t been in a sleeping berth since about 2003, and I haven’t been in a good one (i.e. Non-XPT) since 2000, and I’m really looking forward to it. It’s great to be able to go to sleep in one city and wake up as you approach another, and still have the option to take a shower and grab a good meal on board.

Price wise, it seems o.k. too – $48 for the train v. $36 or so for the bus. Anyone taken both? Worth the extra $12?