CountryLink

CountryLink was established in January 1989 under the Transport Administration Act 1988 as a business unit of what was then the State Rail Authority to operate all non-metropolitan long distance passenger services. It inherited a fleet of XPT and locomotive-hauled passenger trains. Following the election of the Greiner State Government in March 1988, consultants Booz Allen Hamilton were commissioned to prepare a report into NSW rail services. On purely economic grounds, the report recommended closing all country passenger services as they were judged unviable, however this was not politically acceptable. If services were to be maintained, the report recommended an 'all XPT' option with an expanded network of coach services replacing many other services.

In November 1989, the Silver City Comet was withdrawn, while in February 1990 the Brisbane Limited and Pacific Coast Motorail were withdrawn and replaced by XPT services, the Canberra XPT was withdrawn and replaced by locomotive-hauled stock and the Northern Tablelands Express was truncated to Tamworth with road coaches introduced from Sydney to Armidale. The Intercapital Daylight ceased in August 1991 and the Sydney/Melbourne Express in November 1993 was replaced by an XPT in November 1993 following the delivery of additional stock.

In a June 1990 policy reversal, the government announced that it would purchase 17 Xplorer carriages to reintroduce services to Armidale and Moree and replace locomotive-hauled stock and coaches on services to Canberra. This would release an XPT to operate a daily service to operate the Grafton Express replacing a weekly locomotive-hauled service that was reintroduced at the same time. The Xplorers entered service on the North Western service in October 1993 and on the Canberra service in December 1993. In November 1994 the government ordered a further four Xplorer carriages.

In October 1990, the government announced that eight sleeper carriages would be ordered for use on overnight services to Brisbane, Murwillumbah and Melbourne. These were included in an order placed with ABB, Dandenong in 1991 for four power cars and 13 trailers that was jointly funded by the New South Wales and Victorian Governments.

In December 1994, a daylight service to Melbourne resumed by extending the Riverina XPT from Albury.

In 1995, CountryLink trialled three Swedish Railways X2000 tilting train carriages. After conducting a statewide tour in March, they were used on Canberra services from April until June with two modified XPT power cars.

In March 1996, services were reintroduced to Broken Hill and Griffith using refurbished locomotive-hauled rolling stock honouring an election commitment by the Carr State Government. Following the electrification of the Illawarra line from Dapto to Kiama, CityRail was able to release one of its mechanically identical Endeavours and this was converted to an Xplorer to replace the locomotive-hauled stock.

With the formation of RailCorp, responsibility for CountryLink transferred to the new corporation in January 2004. With the closure of the Muwillumbah branch, services were cut back to Casino from May 2004.

CountryLink operated its own rolling stock over track managed by RailCorp in Sydney and the Australian Rail Track Corporation and Rail Infrastructure Corporation outside of Sydney. The hub of its operation was Sydney Central railway station.

North Coast

The North Coast region covers the North Coast, Northern Rivers and South East Queensland regions. Accordingly, the Government of Queensland made a contribution to the provision of these services. North Coast region services appeared on the network map in red. Services ran along the Main North and North Coast lines from Sydney Central station to Roma Street station in Brisbane.

Principal stations served by XPT trains were:

Taree