Central Station's 100th Birthday Party

I have to say I was very dissapointed when I walked down to Central Station on Saturday to take part in the 100th aniversary celebrations.

This week has been an important one for rail heritage in New South Wales, with the state government using the 100th aniversary of the opening of Central Station to announce its future rail heritage plans, but the event itself clearly demonstarted to me that Railcorp is more concerned with the future than celebrating a century of transportation at one of Sydney's oldest stations.

The impression I was left with, after spending several hours wandering around the station, looking at the trains on display, was the the whole thing was a combined childrens birthday party and promotional exhibition for EDI Rail, the manufacturer of the Millenium train - one of the newest trains in the fleet.

The even newer Outer Suburban Cars (also known as OSCAR) (pictured) was also on display, but if its manufacturer, the United Group, was present, I really didnt notice them, except perhaps for one small banner which I can recall.

EDI on the other hand had at least two stalls handing out promotional material on platform one, and another in the main hall, and people on the trains answering questions.

There were a couple of guys in futuristic yet cartoonish jetpack styled outfits, acting like robots, there was also face paining, temporary tattoos, and at least 2 brightly coloured girls, making balloon anmals as they wandered up and down the platform entertaining the kiddies.

There was one old rail motor (CPH 18), a 45 class diesel (4520), idling in the escape road between platforms 3 and 4, and two steam trains running shuttle trips to Hurstville and back (3801, 3830). I got the distinct impression that the "Heritage" part of the display was the steam trains arriving and departing from platform 3 every few minutes.

Where was the electric heritage fleet? Where were the red rattlers which graced Central Station with their presence daily for over 75 years? I have no idea, and am at a loss to explain their absence, considering that Railcorp itself owns two complete and working red rattler sets, which I know were ready for the day, because I have spent one weekend a month for the last 7 months cleaning them!! I cant understand why Railcorp did not have them on show beside the Oscar and Millenium trains - there was definately enough room left on platform one for at least one, or perhaps both heritage sets.

As recently as two weeks ago I was told that at least one of them would be at Central on the day - perhaps both. and I was asked to come along to help guide people through them and answer their questions. The next time I go to Redfern Workshops, I will have a few questions of my own to ask - namely, What happened?.

A recent tour by one of the red rattler sets was postponed because Railcorp could not find drivers qualified to opertate their own heritage fleet, and I have previously been told that they apparently think that the public has little interest in these aging trains - a statement proven wrong by the popularity of the W set when it ran shuttles to Olympic Park last year.

I dont have all the answers yet, but I often get the impression that when it comes to heritage rail, Railcorp and the state government are not really trying, and as was shown today, to them, celebrating 100 years of Central Station history means promoting the two newest trains in its fleet (one of which is so new that it has not even started revenue service yet), and putting on a couple of steam trains to keep the heritage crowd quiet.

I'll post more when I find out why the red rattlers never made it to the party.