A Pacific National (PN) Sydney-to-Perth interstate rail haulage freight train has become the first to make use of the newly minted one-kilometre $4 million track connection from the ARTC network’s Goobang Junction to the company’s Parkes Logistics Terminal in New South Wales.
A PN spokesman said the new rail freight infrastructure was yet another example of the operator’s continued heavy investment in its containerised freight business.
“As regional Australia’s largest intermodal terminal, Pacific National’s $40 million logistics facility at Parkes offers our customers a major launchpad to access the efficiency and productivity benefits of operating 1800-metre double-stacked freight train services between the east and west coasts, via Broken Hill,” he said.
“These interstate services can haul up to 380 shipping containers (TEUs) each trip, helping to provide our customers in the national supply chain with exceptional ESG performance credentials, notably in the area of reducing freight transport emissions.”
Once fully operational, the Parkes Logistics Terminal will have future capacity to consolidate and tranship about 450,000 TEUs each year. This intermodal facility is located at the intersection of major freight transport corridors, including the Trans-Australian Railway (east-west), future Melbourne-Brisbane Inland Rail (north-south), and Newell Highway (north-south).
“From a safety perspective, the new track connection and configuration allows freight trains from Sydney and Brisbane to enter our logistics terminal directly from the east, eliminating the need to overrun the terminal and perform reverse shunting from the west to access the facility,” the spokesman said.
“PN is proud to be part of Parkes, and proud to offer our 300-plus customers unrivalled safety performance, operational capacity and ESG benefits in interstate and transcontinental rail haulage services.”
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