Genessee and Wyoming, who already operated these trains after buying the British operator Freightliner, have purchased the operating company owned by the Swiss mining company Glencore.
http://sports.yahoo.com/news/genesee-wyoming-australia-enter...
This is a very detailed summary of both the situation and the financial aspects.
G&W Australia had some locomotives idle after the fall in iron ore prices, and it seems they may add two more trains to the coal operation using six of the spare locomotives.
They currently haul 40 million tons per year, and all of the trains use ECP braking.
Peter
Looks like the entire URL didn't make it. Try:
http://sports.yahoo.com/news/genesee-wyoming-australia-enters-agreements-060000785.html;_ylt=A0SO80rpbgpYakgA9AhXNyoA;_ylu=X3oDMTByNWU4cGh1BGNvbG8DZ3ExBHBvcwMxBHZ0aWQDBHNlYwNzYw--
Strange that it is under Yahoo Sports...
Anyway, here is another piece:
http://www.railwaygazette.com/news/freight/single-view/view/gw-and-macquarie-to-buy-glencore-rail-coal-haulage-business.html
Are the G&WA C44acis built to the same specs as the Glencore units? If so, then maybe these will be the units transferred.
Is this some standard gauge and some Cape gauge trackage? Thank you for any insight!
This trackage is all standard gauge. The location being discussed is the Hunter Valley Coal Chain, which is a primarily coal-hauling line somewhat similar in scope to the PRB in northeast New South Wales.
G&W A only operates narrow gauge in South Australia, on iron ore lines leading out of Whyalla and on the isolated Eyre Penninsula Railway.
NorthWest Are the G&WA C44acis built to the same specs as the Glencore units? If so, then maybe these will be the units transferred.
Sorry about the foreshortened link. I should have checked it after posting.
I wondered about the Yahoo forum myself.
There have been two "phases" of UGL/GE C44aci construction and separately two designs of frame that result in total masses of 139 and 176 tonnes. The Glencore and G&W Australia units are both the later version with the lighter frame. As far as I know the Glencore XRN type and the G&WA GWU type are identical.
There are nine GWU units. Each Hunter Valley train uses three of the lighter units or in Aurizon's case, two of the heavy units. I'd expect that six GWUs would be transferred. It is always possible that the Downer EDI GT46C ACe GWA units might be transferred since these are very similar and are used in coal service by Pacific National, but I'd expect that the UGL/GE units would be preferred.
Good to know. Thanks!
NorthWest This trackage is all standard gauge. The location being discussed is the Hunter Valley Coal Chain, which is a primarily coal-hauling line somewhat similar in scope to the PRB in northeast New South Wales. G&W A only operates narrow gauge in South Australia, on iron ore lines leading out of Whyalla and on the isolated Eyre Penninsula Railway.
The Hunter Valley coal traffic dates back to the 1840s, using horse drawn rail wagons before the introduction of public railways. There were numerous underground coal mines around Newcastle until the 1950s which were connected by rail. There were larger mines around Maitland, fifteen miles West of Newcastle and further open cut mines have been opened more recently up to a hundred miles north west of the port.
Until the 1950s, a small wooden hopper wagon was standard, carrying ten tons of coal. This was loaded into ships by lifting the hopper from the wagon frame by crane and emptying it into the ship's hold. These wagons had no continuous brakes.
This traffic was able to be maintained because two additional tracks had been laid from Newcastle to Maitland in 1915 to separate the slow coal trains from passenger and other freight traffic. Those tracks are still in place and are used more intensively than ever, now avoiding delay to coal trains from the regular commuter trains and the long distance intermodal trains.
More recently a bi-directionally signalled third track has been added as far as Singleton, a further twenty miles, and additional holding sidings to allow for delays in unloading.
Newcastle is the largest coal export port in the world, and ships a third of Australia's export coal.
Our community is FREE to join. To participate you must either login or register for an account.