The South Western line is a narrow-gauge railway line in the southern part of the state of

Queensland Queensland ( , commonly abbreviated as Qld) is a States and territories of Australia, state in northeastern Australia, and is the second-largest and third-most populous state in Australia. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Austr ...

, Australia. It junctions from the Southern line immediately south of Warwick station and proceeded westwards for a distance of 413 km to the town of

Dirranbandi Dirranbandi is a rural town and locality in the Shire of Balonne, Queensland, Australia. The locality is on the border of Queensland with New South Wales. In the , the locality of Dirranbandi had a population of 610 people. Geography Dirranb ...

. A western extension to Boomie in New South Wales, approved by the Queensland Parliament in 1914, was never constructed. The Thallon-to-Dirranbandi section was closed on 2 September 2010. It services the small towns of

Inglewood Inglewood may refer to: Places Australia *Inglewood, Queensland * Shire of Inglewood, Queensland, a former local government area *Inglewood, South Australia *Inglewood, Victoria *Inglewood, Western Australia Canada * Inglewood, Ontario *Inglewoo ...

(junction of the now closed Texas branch) and

Goondiwindi Goondiwindi () is a rural town and Suburbs and localities (Australia), locality in the Goondiwindi Region, Queensland, Australia. It is on the border of Queensland and New South Wales. In the , the locality of Goondiwindi had a population of 6, ...

as well as the villages of

Yelarbon Yelarbon is a rural town and locality in the Goondiwindi Region, Queensland, Australia. It is on the border of Queensland and New South Wales. In the , the locality of Yelarbon had a population of 313 people. Geography Yelarbon is in south-c ...

and Thallon among others.

History

The South Western line opened as far as

Thane Thane (; previously known as Thana, List of renamed Indian cities and states#Maharashtra, the official name until 1996) is a metropolitan city located on the northwestern side of the list of Indian states, state of Maharashtra in India and on ...

on 1 July 1904 and was completed to Dirranbandi on 21 May 1913. A further extension of the line west of Dirranbandi was approved by Parliament in 1914 but never constructed. Bonathorne station, in

(), prior to 28 June 1917 known as Kundilam, is now abandoned.

Services

The South Western Mail was introduced as a twice weekly service in 1910. Upon the opening of the line to Dirranbandi, the train departed

Brisbane Brisbane ( ; ) is the List of Australian capital cities, capital and largest city of the States and territories of Australia, state of Queensland and the list of cities in Australia by population, third-most populous city in Australia, with a ...

at 20:45, arrived at

Warwick Warwick ( ) is a market town, civil parish and the county town of Warwickshire in the Warwick District in England, adjacent to the River Avon, Warwickshire, River Avon. It is south of Coventry, and south-east of Birmingham. It is adjoined wit ...

04:00,

10:00 and

16:30. The return service departed 11.30, arrived Goondiwindi 17.35, Warwick 23.35 and Brisbane 07.10 the following morning. The South Western line was the last railway in Australia to be serviced by

mail train Many countries have had dedicated railway services for the delivery of postal mail. Examples include: * In Australia, the Travelling post office, Queensland * In Austria, the (1850–2004) * In France, the (1984–2015) were rail cars built s ...

s. The last ''Dirranbandi Mail'' ran on 11 February 1993, and the line was subsequently taken out of regular use, with only the occasional rail tour operating on the line. In 2010-11 the line was extensively damaged by

flooding A flood is an overflow of water ( or rarely other fluids) that submerges land that is usually dry. In the sense of "flowing water", the word may also be applied to the inflow of the tide. Floods are of significant concern in agriculture, civi ...

, and the line from Thallon to Dirranbandi was officially closed, as it was damaged beyond repair. The rest of the line was rebuilt, and in recent years

Watco Watco Companies, L.L.C. (Watco) Watco is an American transportation and logistics company based in Pittsburg, Kansas. The company’s core services are freight transportation, material handling and storage, logistics, railcar repair and maintena ...

began operating grain trains on the line from Thallon to the Port of Brisbane. These operations have taken large amounts of trucks off the state’s highway network.

Current line standards

The section from Warwick to Goodiwindi is laid with 30, 41 & 47 kg/m rail, 25-50% steel sleepers, a maximum axle load of 15.75 tonnes and a line speed of 80 km/h. The steepest grade on the section is 1 in 44 (~2.3%), and the minimum radius curve is 200m. The next section to Thallon has similar rail, a 70 km/h line speed to Toobeah, 60 km/h beyond, a maximum grade of 1 in 50 (2%) and minimum 400m radius curves. Prior to closure, the last section to Dirranbandi had 20 kg/m rail, a 10 tonne

axle load The axle load of a wheeled vehicle is the total weight bearing on the roadway for all wheels connected to a given axle. Axle load is an important design consideration in the engineering of roadways and railways, as both are designed to tolerate a m ...

and 40 km/h line speed. Consistent with the rest of the Queensland regional railways, the line is

narrow gauge A narrow-gauge railway (narrow-gauge railroad in the US) is a railway with a track gauge (distance between the rails) narrower than . Most narrow-gauge railways are between and . Since narrow-gauge railways are usually built with Minimum railw ...

().

Gallery

References

External links

1925 map of the Queensland railway system
{{Railway lines in Queensland, state=collapsed Darling Downs Railway lines in Queensland Railway lines opened in 1904 South West Queensland 1904 establishments in Australia