198007 – Johnston – Normally De-energised Reversible Coded Track Circuits

In the late 1960’s and early 1970’s traffic between Tailem Bend and Wolseley on the Adelaide to Melbourne main line had reached saturation under electric staff working and the delays being experienced by trains were proving an embarrassment to the management of the then South Australian Railways (and probably the Victorian Railways) who were endeavouring to provide an attractive service to their customers.

The method chosen to alleviate the situation resulted in the introduction of the first Centralised Traffic Control system into South Australia with the normally de-energised reversible coded track circuits being used in the block sections.