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Rail line connecting Casino with Lismore, Byron and Murwillumbah was opened. Exact date not known.
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Queensland South Coast line reaches Tweed, prompting calls in NSW parliament to extend the line to Murwillumbah. Exact date not known.
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Idea to extend South Coast line dropped. Exact date not known.
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Branch line opened between Booyong and Ballina. This section of the line struggled for years and was eventually badly damaged in a flood and decomissioned. More broadly the line has become a mainstay of life on the Northern Rivers and one of the main connectors for the region's towns and villages.
Exact date not known. -
Services on branch line suspended after flood and landslip damage.
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The Ballina branch line is officially closed.
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The popular Gold Coast Motor Rail Express Service, known affectionately as the "Surf Train", is closed. The Surf Train is then replaced by a daily XPT service.
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A YouTube video from 2002 showing the Ritz train
The Ritz Rail tourist train starts running services between Casino and Murwillumbah. The service folded a few months before NSW then Transport Minister Michael Costa closed the line in 2004. The last of the Ritz carriages were auctioned off in 2011. -
Freight services on the line officially end. Exact date not known.
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Casino train station celebrates its centenary as rumours grow about government plans to close the branch line.
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As the Branch Line prepares to mark its Centenary, Transport Minister Michael Costa announces the line has degraded and would cost $188 million to fix. At first he says the line will remain open until the end of the year, but then closes it mid-year amidst claims the Government allowed the line to degrade by siphoning maintenance funding on to other projects.
A PriceWaterhouseCoopers study commissioned by then Richmond MP Larry Anthony finds most of the line is fine and would cost $30m to fix. -
In a show of cross-party support, prominent local Labor Party member Sue Dakin and Nationals Ballina MP Don Page pose togther for the announcement of a protest train, which it is hoped will change the minds of politicians in Sydney.
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An XPT packed full of protesters from all walks of life leaves Lismore Train Station, bound for Sydney where Northern Rivers residents hope to make their voices heard.
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Flooding across the region causes major damage to the line, particularly in the Byron Shire, triggering the new Transport Minister John Watkins to announce in 2006 it would cost $150m to fix. He offers $75m to fix the line if the Federal Government will match it.
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The NSW Nationals go to the 2007 election with a policy of restoring the line and running a commuter train service on it, along with a commitment to look at the long called-for extension of the line to Queensland. This policy remains in place after 2007 and continues up to the 2011 election, which put them in government.
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A report on the line commissioned by the coalition when it won office is finally released, claiming the cost of repairing the line is now up to $900 million and that it would not serve the Northern Rivers effectively.
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At Byron Bay the rail corridor is pulled into the debate over the Byron Bypass, and a group of residents suggests the 40m-wide corridor could become a combination rail trail/vehicle corridor and light rail between Old Bangalow Road and the Arts and Industry Estate. One idea put up at a public forum on the rail link is to use old Melbourne trams on the track.
