Gladstone railway station is located on the Crystal Brook-Broken Hill line in

Gladstone, South Australia Gladstone (including the former town of Booyoolie) is a small rural town in the Mid North of South Australia in the approach to the lower Flinders Ranges. At the Census in Australia#2006, 2006 census, Gladstone had a population of 629. The tow ...

History

Gladstone station opened in 1876 when a line opened from

Port Pirie Port Pirie is a small city on the east coast of the Spencer Gulf in South Australia, north of the state capital, Adelaide. Port Pirie is the largest city and the main retail centre of the Mid North region of South Australia. The city has an ex ...

in the west, it was later extended east to

Peterborough Peterborough ( ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city in the City of Peterborough district in the Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county of Cambridgeshire, England. The city is north of London, on the River Nene. A ...

and ultimately

Broken Hill Broken Hill is a city in the Far West (New South Wales), far west region of outback New South Wales, Australia. An inland mining city, it is near the border with South Australia on the crossing of the Barrier Highway (A32) and the Silver City Hi ...

. In 1888, a line was built north to Laura and ultimately Wilmington. When the Hamley Bridge line from

Balaklava Balaklava ( Ukrainian and , , ) is a settlement on the Crimean Peninsula and part of the city of Sevastopol. It is an administrative center of Balaklavsky District that used to be part of the Crimean Oblast before it was transferred to Sevast ...

in the south reached Gladstone in 1894, it became a four-way

junction station ''Junction station'' usually refers to a railway station situated either on or close to a rail junction, where lines to two or more destinations diverge. Many junction stations have multiple platform faces to enable trains for multiple destinatio ...

. All were built as narrow gauge lines.Gladstone
National Railway MuseumGladstone's Railway History
Gladstone In 1927, the line from the south was converted to broad gauge, making Gladstone a

break of gauge With railways, a break of gauge occurs where a line of one track gauge (the distance between the rails, or between the wheels of trains designed to run on those rails) meets a line of a different gauge. Trains and railroad car, rolling stock g ...

station. As part of the standardisation project, the line between

Port Augusta Port Augusta (''Goordnada'' in the revived indigenous Barngarla language) is a coastal city in South Australia about by road from the state capital, Adelaide. Most of the city is on the eastern shores of Spencer Gulf, immediately south of the ...

and

was converted to standard gauge in 1969, thus Gladstone became a junction for three gauges. The broad-gauge connection between Gladstone and Adelaide was closed in May 1988. The narrow-gauge Wilmington railway line was closed in 1990 thus making Gladstone an only standard gauge station on the Crystal Brook-Broken Hill railway line.

Services

Journey Beyond's weekly ''

Indian Pacific The ''Indian Pacific'' is a weekly experiential tourism-oriented passenger train service that runs in Australia's east–west rail corridor between Sydney, on the shore of the Pacific Ocean, and Perth, on the shore of the Indian Ocean – ...

'' service between

Sydney Sydney is the capital city of the States and territories of Australia, state of New South Wales and the List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city in Australia. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Syd ...

and

Perth Perth () is the list of Australian capital cities, capital city of Western Australia. It is the list of cities in Australia by population, fourth-most-populous city in Australia, with a population of over 2.3 million within Greater Perth . The ...

passes through Gladstone but does not stop.

References

External links

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Flickr gallery
{{Webarchive, url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160317052537/http://www.johnnyspages.com/peterborough-2_may_2005.htm#gladstone , date=17 March 2016 Disused railway stations in South Australia Railway stations in Australia opened in 1876