ATN Access, a company once owned jointly by a number of international investment banks and Tranz Rail New Zealand, held a contract with the Australian Wheat Board for the rail haulage of export grain from country NSW/Victoria to both Port Kembla in NSW and Appleton Dock in Victoria. This video focuses on the NSW operation (essentially Junee-Moss Vale-Sydney-Port Kembla-Moss Vale-Junee).
To fulfill its contract, ATN Access purchased 44 new XGAY Class 72 tonnes capacity grain wagons from China, four L Class 3000 HP Clyde-GM ex-WAGR locomotives (for mainline work) and three 830 Class 900 HP Goodwin-Alco ex-SAR locomotives (foor branchline operations). The intention was to operate the train with three L class Junee-Moss Vale-Port Kembla, however initial trials in June 2000 revealed that the braking systems on the XGAY wagons could not handle the 20 kilometers of continuous 1 in 30 descent of the Moss Vale-Unanderra line, and the train was forced to operate via Sydney. To handle the long 1 in 40 climb in the Sydney metropolitan between Como and Waterfall, an additional 1800 HP, in the form of two 830 Class, was added.
Reliability of the aging L and 830 Classes was less than desirable, resulting in ATN Access consistently having to lease a large variety of different locomotive classes (B, GM, EL, T, 18, 47, 48, 422, 442, 80, 82 etc) from many operators (such as Austrac, ASR, CFCLA, Freight Corp, GNR LVR, RIC and others). The resultant lashups resulted in some spectacular combinations of locomotive types and logos many of which are captured in this video.
Sadly in early 2003however, because of the severe drought and subsequent lack of grain, ATN Access was forced to place its grain train wagons into storage and to lease out its locomotives. The train did make a return to service in 2004, but shortly afterwards was sold and integrated into Pacific National.
Approximate run time: 58 minutes.