Peter Goers: We saved the Polly Waffle from extinction. We must save The Overland train service from Adelaide-Melbourne
We saved the Polly Waffle for extinction. Now South Australians must do their bit to save the famous Overland train service, writes Peter Goers. TAKE OUR POLL.
Opinion
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- December 2019: Overland service given last-minute lifeline
- December 2018: Vics step in to save Overland for another year.
It’s my fault and your fault. The famous Overland train from Adelaide to Melbourne may be permanently derailed because not enough of us are using it.
It’s the Polly Waffle Principle.
In 2012 I was shocked to learn the Polly Waffle had been withdrawn from sale three years before through lack of sales. People were nostalgic about the Polly Waffle but not buying them.
I’ve always called it the Melbourne Express even though it’s been The Overland since, I blush to say, 1935 and it hasn’t been express for yonks. I’ve driven to Melbourne twice, used the bus once, flown there many times and used the Overland/Melbourne Express for exactly one return trip in a party of university students when we were only in second class because there was no third class and we spent most of the trip in the breezy space between carriages smoking a variety of substances. And I don’t even like Melbourne.
In the Trainaceous Period of living memory, SA and the nation was latticed with train tracks. It was not Don Dunstan’s finest hour when he flogged our railways to the Commonwealth nor the Commonwealth’s finest hour when it privatised rail in 1997.
Like all privatisations it meant getting less and paying more.
However Great Southern Rail now Journey Beyond has done a fine job with the Indian Pacific and The Ghan but The Overland remains the poor cousin.
Of course interstate trains are not running because of COVID-19 but I spent a fruitless 19 minutes on hold this week to Journey Beyond to get information on prices. I gave up.
After 133 years of reasonably faithful service The Overland may never run again. Surely it must be revived.
The Melbourne Express, the Adelaide Express (from Melbourne) and The Overland were nightly services in both directions and the trains crossed in Daipur (near Kaniva as in “Kaniva cup of tea?”).
You looked through the windows from your couchette or roomette or from your seat or from the dining car over a steaming pie floater to what Nabokov called “the necklace of lights in the black velvet night”.
Then it became a day train which takes just over ten hours and perhaps it was better as a night train because it saved a night’s accommodation, you didn’t waste a day travelling and there ain’t a lot to see by day anyway.
The Overland ain’t cheap but it’s assuredly worth it.
It’s $250 one way in first class (including three yummy meals) and $164 one way in second class (with no meals provided).
But, be still my beating heart, you are allowed 60kg of luggage in first and 40kg in second class. If only I’d known ... The only thing it has in common with the Orient Express is it’s also a train but the Orient Express charges $106, 804.50 for two people in a sleeper. You could buy a train for that!
The Overland has been subsidised by state governments but our SA Government withdrew it’s minor funding in 2018.
Ironically the Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews who is discouraging Victorians from coming to SA (which is good because we don’t want virus-ridden Victorians here) has kept up the subsidy only until June 30 this year and The Overland may cease to exist except in our hearts.
We need The Overland. We need more transport not less.
We need to celebrate and revive this great train and Dr John Wilson’s excellent recent book The Overland : A Social History and his indefatigable advocacy is a good start. He writes; “Show me the person who actually enjoys the airport experience”.
Trains generally depart and arrive conveniently in the middle of cities, unlike planes. In Adelaide our interstate trains are at the dismal Keswick Railway Station but that’s another even more insoluble saga.
Here’s the rub – trains are much more ecologically sound.
Flying to Melbourne each passenger is personally responsible for releasing about 200kg of carbon dioxide into the world.
On a train to Melbourne, they release a mere 8kg.
There is a righteous romance and rhythm (clickety, clickety clack) and comfort to train travel. May people travel the world to travel by train. Governments are clamouring to get fast trains and slow trams yet want rid of The Overland.
Robern Menz has been subsidised by the Federal Government to revive the Polly Waffle and that should be the train of thought for our noble Overland.
And we must use it or lose it. Viva The Overland.
Peter Goers can be heard weeknights and Sundays on ABC Radio Adelaide