Does this offer still apply?
It used to prop up pax numbers on our country rail system. And with only one country rail service in SA now offering a sit up service I am wondering if it is still available.
I see no reason for a subsidy to be paid to a corporate body to remain in business, then on top of that pay a subsidy to a group of people generally using it as a tourist excercise.A free return Stateliner ticket to any SA destination would be much more practical/use-able.
Better to use such an additional subsidy for pensioners living beyond the PT network to access a trip to Adelaide (multiple if necessary) for medical needs, hopefully they could have got the subsidy for such journeys up to 100% or as near as possible.
As a long time memory there was an annual free rail trip offered to Pensioners in South Australia.I thought that this was a hangover from the sell-off to Commonwealth Railways (and then AN) of the South Australian Railways back in 1975 or so.
Does this offer still apply?
It used to prop up pax numbers on our country rail system. And with only one country rail service in SA now offering a sit up service I am wondering if it is still available.
Hello all, i have a story to tell.Well you wont be able to do it any more with the vouchers Heath as they no longer are given out. I am a pensioner and in all the time I had my pension never used them. But others have. My mother and her friend years back both travelled to and from Melbourne on the Overland sitting up and used the vouchers, but now you have to pay the full concession fare from Adelaide to Melbourne and return. Free trips are only now available on Adelaide Metro if you have a seniors card and then only at certain times and days.
I remember my mother, as a part of her single parent pension, used to get an annual rail voucher - for one return trip from Adelaide to either port Augusta, broken hill, or bordertown - when using GSR red seat service.
When i was about 4 years old, in the year 2003, i remember she used her rail pass and took me on the Ghan from Adelaide to Port Augusta and return a few days later, for a short holiday.
I, being a small boy who had been no further than grange on the local train, marveled at the really long sleek ghan train, and how comfy the big plush seats were to sit in.
I remember on they way up when they announced the stop for Coonamia - aboriginal word for port pirie - and i was fascinated by the city lights over in the distance when we stopped at this remote siding.
When it was time to return, i vividly recall standing on the looooooong platform at port augusta, at 2 oclock in the morning, and watching the ghan glide into the platform as the train attendants tossed out bags of rubbish.
Thanks to rail vouchers, i now have a love for long distance train travel that has led to mum and myself doing the ghan to alice springs, the indian pacific to sydney, the overland to melbourne, and amtrak travel through 35 US states on world famous trains.
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