The NGR offered both passenger and freight service and also delivered letters and packages for the post office. The NGR operated at a loss during its early years, but after the Second Boer War, the NGR made around half of the Natal government's income.
In 1893 the company owned 91 locomotives, 231 coaches and 1451 goods wagons.
The NGR was one of the Natal government's largest investments - around 30% of the Colony's debt was run up to build the lines, but between 1880 and 1910, the railways' income contributed 40-50% of the colonial government's revenues. The greatest driver of this growth was the extension of the rail lines to Johannesburg after gold was discovered there.
NRC passenger services were taken over by the NGR in 1877. From 1 December 1880, onward, the NGR offered travel once a day between Durban and Pietermaritzburg. The journey from Durban to Pietermaritzburg lasted 6 hours and 14 minutes with an average speed of 18.1 km/h (11.2 mph), while the return to Durban lasted 5 hours and 45 minutes with an average speed of 19.6 km/h (12.2 mph). A first-class return ticket at first cost £29 9p, a second-class one £17 6p. In 1903, the cost was still around the same - £26 8p first-class and £17 9p second-class. A first-class ticket to Johannesburg cost £9-5-6 (R18.55) with its second-class equivalent priced at £6-14-0. According to the NGR handbook, there was no official racial discrimination. Harrison and Ingram, editors of the handbook, wrote of the service that it "caters for the requirements of first, second, and third class travellers, although the latter class is almost entirely monopolised by the coloured community." However, Mahatma Gandhi, as a young lawyer, was thrown off a first-class car in Pietermaritzburg in 1892 on account of his race, the turning point of his life.
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From 1881 to 1889, the NGR averaged 400,000 passengers a year. With the opening of the line to the border of the ZAR, the figure rose to 600,000, and the opening of the line from Durban to the Rand drove numbers to almost 1.2 million. After the Second Boer War, around 2.5 to 3 million passengers a year used the NGR.
Freight
Initially, NGR trains carried both freight and passengers. In the early years of the NGR, sugar and coal were the most important goods. After the discovery of gold, consumer goods carried between the Port of Durban and the Rand made up one of the leading uses of the NGR. Around the same time, the transport of agricultural products, especially acacia trees shipped to the Witwatersrand mines, grew by leaps and bounds. Between 1970 and 1909, the amount of cultivated land increased dramatically. In 1870, 736 km2 (284 mi2) of land were cultivated, but in 1891 1,580 km2 (610 mi2), of which 343 km2 (132 mi2) was owned by whites, were being farmed, and in 1909 that number rose to 4,020 km2 (1,550 mi2), of which 2,190 km2 (850 mi2) was owned by whites.
Sugar
One of the main purposes of the line from Durban to The Point was to carry sugar. Although sugarcane (umoba in Zulu) was known to the Zulu, they did not grow it. In 1847, 40,000 sugarcane seedlings were imported from Mauritius and Réunion. The settlers experimented with several varieties. Commercial cultivation of sugarcane began in 1850 with the tilling of 20 ha (49 acres). By 1859, 1,664 ha (4,110 acres) were under cultivation. Between 1854 and 1858, before the first railway was built, Natal exported on average 41 tons of sugar a year. Between 1859 and 1863 (when the NRC's first line was built), the annual output grew 25-fold to 1,103 tons. Between 1884 and 1888, after the North Coast and South Coast Lines were built, the annual export multiplied tenfold to 11,370 tons.
Coal
In 1840, the members of the Beeskommando under the leadership of Andries Pretorius used local coal to fuel their campfires. In 1860, the Talana Colliery opened on Coalfields farm near the town of Dundee. Thomas Paterson Smith used this coal to manufacture his own bricks.
In 1889, the line from Ladysmith to Newcastle was completed, and a private branch line was built from Glencoe to Dundee. In 1889, the Dundee Coal Company was founded with the NGR as its biggest customer. At the same time, another mine was established near the railway in Elandslaagte (25 km (16 mi) north of Ladysmith). In 1898, the first coal was mined in Vryheid, but the city had to wait until 1906 for the line to arrive. In 1908, the line reached Hlobane, and its mine was opened the following year.
The expansion of the railways fostered immense growth in the Natal coal industry. In 1889, production came to 25,609 tons, but by 1909 it had reached 1,669,583 tons. In 1908, the largest users of coal were the ships that carried 800,000 tons of coal a year out of Durban. The railway itself used 250,000 tons, and other local users consumed 150,000 tons. By then, the export trade had developed significantly - in 1908, 446,915 tons of coal were shipped out of Natal, either overseas or to neighboring states.
Acacia
Black wattle Acacia mearnsii is one of the main crops of the so-called "mistbelt forest" of Natal, a region lying between 1,000–1,500 m (3,300–4,900 ft) above sea level. The bark of the wattle was used to make tannin for the leather industry. The wattle wood was also used for mine pillars on the Rand. The first wattle seeds were imported from Australia in the 1860s. Initially, it was planted as a shade tree on farms, but George Sutton recognized its commercial growth potential in 1876. Wattle bark was first exported to England in 1886, and the 10 tons exported the following year fetched a good price. By 1910, 60,000 km2 (23,000 mi2) were planted with the tree, and 24,000 tons were harvested that year.
This growth was made possible by the construction of rail lines to the planted areas, especially the 104 km (65 mi) Greytown Line (built 1899-1900) and the 172 km (107 mi) Natal-Cape Line (built 1904-1909). These railways brought the majority of the wattle crop to the main Natal line.
Farm towns
The Natal Agricultural Development Act of 1904 made crown lands available for purchase by farmers at favorable rates. The legislation was geared toward promoting agriculture for food self-sufficiency in the colony as well as to grow crops for export, particularly to the Rand. Farming towns were established, among other areas, around Weenen, Winterton, and Illovo. Irrigation was set up near Winterton and Weenen. New railway was built at the same time by the Natal government, including the Bo-Tugela Line connecting Winterton to the main line and the narrow-gauge Weenen and Mid-Illovo Lines doing the same for those villages. Another narrow-gauge track, the 122.2 km (75.9 mi) Alfred County Line, was authorized to connect Harding with the South Coast Line, built in two sections: the first went 39.2 km (24.4 mi) from Port Shepstone to Paddock and was ordered by the Natal government in 1909 (finished in 1911), the second 83 km (52 mi) the rest of the way ordered by the government of the Union of South Africa in 1913 (finished in 1915).
