Grafton Express
The Grafton Express is the name for the Australian passenger train service operating between Central [railway station, Sydney|Sydney] and Grafton railway station, [New South Wales|Grafton] via the North Coast [railway line, New South Wales|North Coast line].
In February 1990, the long-standing North [Coast Daylight Express|Holiday Coast XPT] was axed as part of a restructure of CountryLink services. With the other New [South Wales XPT|XPT] services struggling to keep up with weekend demand, in June 1990 a service to Grafton was reinstated. It ran on Fridays only to Grafton and Sundays only to Sydney but during school holidays ran daily. It was formed of locomotive hauled HUB type carriage stock|HUB]/RUB type carriage stock|RUB] stock with the headcode NL35/NL36.
Initially hauled by 86 class locomotive|86 class] electric locomotives south of Broadmeadow, however from March 1992 it was hauled by diesel locomotives throughout usually a 442 class locomotive|442 class]. The locomotive hauled Grafton Express last ran in November 1993.
With the National Party having lost a number of North Coast seats in the 1990 Federal election in a policy reversal it was announced that Xplorer railcars would be purchased to extend the Northern Tablelands Express with an XPT to be released to operate a daily service to Grafton. Thus in November 1993 the Grafton XPT began, a service that continues today.