CountryLink was established in January 1989 under the Transport Administration Act 1988 as a business unit of what was then the
State Rail Authority to operate all non-metropolitan long distance passenger services. It inherited a fleet of XPT and locomotive-hauled passenger trains. Following the election of the
Greiner State Government in March 1988, consultants
Booz Allen Hamilton were commissioned to prepare a report into NSW rail services. On purely economic grounds, the report recommended closing all country passenger services as they were judged unviable, however this was not politically acceptable. If services were to be maintained, the report recommended an 'all XPT' option with an expanded network of coach services replacing many other services. In November 1989, the
Silver City Comet was withdrawn, while in February 1990 the
Brisbane Limited and
Pacific Coast Motorail were withdrawn and replaced by XPT services, the
Canberra XPT was withdrawn and replaced by locomotive-hauled stock and the
Northern Tablelands Express was truncated to
Tamworth with road coaches introduced from Sydney to
Armidale. The
Intercapital Daylight ceased in August 1991 and the
Sydney/Melbourne Express in November 1993 was replaced by an XPT in November 1993 following the delivery of additional stock. In a June 1990 policy reversal, the government announced that it would purchase 17
Xplorer carriages to reintroduce services to
Armidale and
Moree and replace locomotive-hauled stock and coaches on services to
Canberra. This would release an XPT to operate a daily service to operate the
Grafton Express replacing a weekly locomotive-hauled service that was reintroduced at the same time. The Xplorers entered service on the North Western service in October 1993 and on the Canberra service in December 1993. In November 1994 the government ordered a further four Xplorer carriages. In October 1990, the government announced that eight sleeper carriages would be ordered for use on overnight services to
Brisbane,
Murwillumbah and
Melbourne. These were included in an order placed with
ABB,
Dandenong in 1991 for four power cars and 13 trailers that was jointly funded by the New South Wales and Victorian Governments. In December 1994, a daylight service to Melbourne resumed by extending the
Riverina XPT from
Albury. In 1995, CountryLink trialled three
Swedish Railways X2000 tilting train carriages. After conducting a statewide tour in March, they were used on Canberra services from April until June with two modified XPT power cars. In March 1996, services were reintroduced to
Broken Hill and
Griffith using refurbished locomotive-hauled rolling stock honouring an election commitment by the
Carr State Government. Following the electrification of the
Illawarra line from
Dapto to
Kiama,
CityRail was able to release one of its mechanically identical
Endeavours and this was converted to an Xplorer to replace the locomotive-hauled stock. With the formation of
RailCorp, responsibility for CountryLink transferred to the new corporation in January 2004. With the closure of the
Muwillumbah branch, services were cut back to
Casino from May 2004. CountryLink was merged with the intercity services of
CityRail to form
NSW TrainLink on 1 July 2013.
Patronage The following table lists patronage figures for the network during the corresponding financial year. Australia's financial years start on 1 July and end on 30 June. ==Network==