Where can i find a streamliner?
Obviously given we are talking about a style of locomotive now many decades old, even the youngest of which is nearing fifty, tracking down examples of these classic machines can be tricky. Their age has well and truly passed. However, with a little research it’s not impossible to mount a successful hunt for Australian streamliners. In 2019 there are essentially three ways of tracking down our streamliners – the easy, the not so easy, and the outright challenging.
- The easy: Fortunately, a few streamliners exists in museums so tracking them down is not hard. The downside is, there’s not many that are accessible every day.
- The not-so-easy: Preserved streamliners frequently operate heritage and tourist trips, either on Australian mainlines or on branch lines reserved for heritage operations. If you know when and where they’ll be running, that helps. The trouble is, they obviously don’t run every day. We’ve provided some links to some of the operators who run these trips on the pages listed below, and be sure to check out our Facebook page for more information.
- The outright challenging: The holy grail – Australian streamliners still running in commercial service. They are out there, and they do run most days, but sometimes it can be hard to know when and where, and even then – horror of horrors – they may not actually be leading the train! We know, right! Again, this is topic that might be covered on our Facebook page, or drop us an email via our Contact page and we might be able to advise if we know where a streamliner might pop up in coming days.
But for now, check out our rough guides below. We’ll tackle this state-by-state, for that is the most likely way we expect travellers and rail fans will tackle this challenge.
Currently there are no regular streamliner operations in either Tasmania or the Australian Capital Territory, although NSW heritage tours could bring a streamliner into the latter on rare occasions.