hauling
The Overland at
North Shore, November 2008
Formation and ATN acquisition In February 2002, National Rail's freight operations and rollingstock, jointly owned by the
Federal,
New South Wales and
Victorian Governments, were combined with FreightCorp, owned by the New South Wales Government, and sold to a
joint venture between Patrick Corporation and Toll Holdings, trading as Pacific National. In February 2004, Pacific National purchased Australian Transport Network, operator of ATN Access and
AN Tasrail. In August 2004, Pacific National purchased
Freight Australia, giving Pacific National control of the Victorian non-urban rail track, excluding the interstate network which is controlled by the
Australian Rail Track Corporation. , February 2009 The
Australian Competition and Consumer Commission attached special conditions to the sale to ensure competition in the rail freight industry. The company was required to provide a "starter pack" of locomotives, wagons, train paths, and freight terminals for a third party rail operator on the east-west route across the
Nullarbor Plain. To fulfil that, Pacific National sold nine refurbished
G class locomotives to competitor
SCT Logistics to allow it to operate its own services.
Ownership In 2005,
Toll Holdings launched a successful hostile takeover of its joint venture partner
Patrick Corporation, giving Toll Holdings 100% ownership of Pacific National. In 2007, Toll Holdings was restructured into two separately
ASX listed companies: Toll Holdings and
Asciano Limited. As part of this restructure, Pacific National became a wholly owned subsidiary of Asciano Limited. In 2016, Asciano agreed to sell Pacific National to Australian Logistics Acquisition Investments Pty Ltd, a consortium of
Global Infrastructure Partners,
CPP Investment Board,
China Investment Corporation,
GIC Private Limited and
British Columbia Investment Management Corporation. The transfer was completed on 19 August 2016.
Queensland expansion (2005-present) In March 2005, Pacific National Queensland became the first non-
Queensland Rail narrow gauge commercial rail operation in Queensland, with the commencement of container services between
Brisbane and
Cairns. In 2009, Pacific National Queensland further expanded its narrow gauge operations, entering the export coal market, then dominated by incumbent Queensland Rail.
Tasmania withdrawal (2005-2009) In September 2005, Pacific National angered the
Tasmanian State and
Australian Federal Governments when it threatened to withdraw all services unless the governments paid a $100 million subsidy. Initially the governments refused to act on the issue claiming they would not be "held to mercy" by Pacific National, owned by
Toll and
Patrick Corporation, "which are extremely profitable multi-national companies". However, state infrastructure minister
Bryan Green and federal counterpart transport minister
Warren Truss announced a $120 million rescue package. In May 2007, the Tasmanian Government, the Federal Government and Pacific National came to an agreement regarding the funding, ownership and operation of the Tasmanian railway network; with the Tasmanian Government acquiring the railway infrastructure previously leased to Pacific National, who would continue to provide above rail services on the network. In September 2009, the Tasmanian Government purchased the Tasmanian rail business, with rail infrastructure and railway operations to be maintained, managed and owned by a new
TasRail. In November 2006, Pacific National entered into an agreement to sell the remainder of its Victorian rail lease of the network back to the Victorian Government. The sale was completed in May 2007, with the government-owned
V/Line taking over management of the track.
Downsizing controversy (2007-2008) In December 2007, Pacific National announced plans to sell or close its grain transport and Portlink rural container business operations in Victoria, selling or closing Patrick's intermodal freight business in Tasmania, and downsizing to a bare minimum Pacific National's grain operations across New South Wales. The decision was criticised as it forced grain growers to use higher cost road transport to transport the annual grain harvest from rural silos to the ports. The decision has saw many commentators accuse Pacific National of acquiring the operations of
Freight Australia in 2004 only for the purposes of
asset stripping and eliminating competition in rail freight. In 2008, the company declined to sell wagons which had reached the end of their useful life to other Australian rail operators, indicating that the wagons would be scrapped or exported to
Saudi Arabia. The container freight service to
Horsham,
Victoria was almost cancelled in April 2008 but was given a three-month reprieve by the company. In July 2008, the service was taken over by
QR National and later Qube. ==Operations==