LISTEN - WinAmp, iTunes, XMMS

LISTEN - RealPlayer
LISTEN - Windows Media Player 9 only

Welcome to the Bundaberg Sugar Cane Industrial Railroad Stream, located in Bundaberg, Queensland Australia. 

This unusual industrial railroad operation is part of the Bundaberg Sugar Company. The railroad operations consists of hauling the cut cane from the fields to the local processing plants using a 2 ft narrowguage track system. The motive power and rolling stock consists of both full-sized and dinky sized industrial switchers and slightly down-sized  hopper cars.

The operating hours for the trains are 24 hours a day as they undertake the big harvest/hauling effort of the season which extends from around June to December each year. Some days, usually at the weekend, are rostered for mill maintenance, so operations will be less on these occasions.

You will hear both the locomotive driver (engineer) and the Company dispatcher talking on the radio via a repeater system. The trains call in their location to dispatch as they pass set control points as there are no signals on the line except in the sugar factory yards. Routine instructions and requests will be made over the radio, and the occasional derailment or minor mishap may be heard.

There are two operational mills in the Bundaberg area, at Bingera, north of the Burnett River, and at Millaquin south of the river. These two mills now crush cane from the area that up until 1974 was served by five mills, and the trains operate over a network of tracks that once served all five mill areas.

Bingera Mill has a network of around 350 kilometres of track while Millaquin has around 170 kilometres. The two systems are linked by a ferry which carries road trucks that in turn carry the cane trucks. Trucks are winched on/off the road trucks at rail yards close to the ferry terminals. Significant quantities of cane from north of the river are thus crushed at Millaquin Mill. The two mills crush a total of around 3 million tonnes of cane each season!

The trains are identified by the locomotive name. Rosters can be found at http://www.lrrsa.org.au/QLD_locolist_June2005.htm Locomotives may sometimes be transferred between the two mills to meet operating requirements.

"Bundaberg Sugar, in its northern and southern regions, has an extensive cane railway network comprising approximately 950kms of track. Around 40 cane trains operate 24 hours a day during the crushing season which usually extends from May to November each year. "

The railroad crosses many public roads at grade, and the Bundaberg Sugar Company has gone out of it's way to educate and reach out to the public about the dangers of ignoring railroad crossing signals and of trespassing on the railroad's right of way.

 Remember there is a +17hr time difference between Queensland and West Coast Time Zone. And the Australian accents and station names may take a little getting used to. 

Please check out the Forum dedicated to this stream for additional info pertaining to this stream.

Here are some photos of the trains and locos of the Bundaberg Cane Train Operation supplied by the Stream Host. Thanks Bob!

Loco Kolan and loco Invicta at Wallaville staging area Invicta bring more cane in

for the bigger loco Kolan to take back to Bingara sugar mill

Loco Bucca brings a load of bins back to the Fairymead staging area to be taken to Bingara sugar mill

An inside shot of loco Kolan's main console

 

Here is a photo of a scale model of Wallaville staging area for sugar cane to go to Bingara sugar mill for crushing. The actual loco in this working model are the same as the real locos down to the last detail - even the names!!

Here is a link to a site on youtube to see it actually working http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0U_ll1xKTw

  

A quick pic of a 22 tonne Baldwin loco heading back to Fairymead to the staging area for transport to Bingara mill for crushing. Here is a url to Youtube to view  a full video clip http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1KzDhWznMbU.