Silver Star (train)

The Silver Star was a luxury passenger train that ran overnight between Auckland and Wellington on the North Island Main Trunk railway of New Zealand. The train ran from Monday, 6 September 1971 until Sunday, 8 June 1979. It replaced the Night Limited express passenger trains, which provided a faster service than the "Ordinary" Expresses by stopping at only six intermediate stations en-route and not dragging postal or parcels vans at the rear. Designed as a "hotel on wheels", its carriages were distinctive in New Zealand; rather than being painted in the traditional red, the Silver Star's carriages were made of stainless steel, and silver in appearance.

Introduction

The train was NZR's attempt to compete with the introduction of jet aircraft for business traffic between Auckland and Wellington, but was effectively ten years too late. Travel by plane took just over one hour; the Silver Star, by contrast, took around 12 hours and 30 minutes. While popular at holiday times, it simply could not attract enough passengers willing to pay a premium to travel by train between the two cities.

Demise

New Zealand Railways at the time also ran another overnight train service, which stopped at more than double the stations of the Silver Star, typically, yet un-officially, called the "Ordinary" Express, which had much older (1930s/1940s-built) rolling stock, and which had no on-board buffet service, but had cheaper fares (and three classes of accommodation). By refurbishing this train in 1975, which became the Northerner, many rail passengers preferred to pay around 33% less for a large reclining seat or 15% less for a 2-berth sleeper cabin without shower or toilet, than pay for a Silver Star cabin - more upmarket travellers simply preferred to fly.

Rolling stock and motive power

The 31 coaches were manufactured by Mitsubishi Shoji-Kaisha and it was hauled by diesel locomotives (initially two DA class locomotives, and later one DX class) for a six-night-a-week service. All passengers were carried in sleeping cars, with 12 being eight two-berth (incorporating separate bathrooms with showers for each cabin) "Twinette" and 12 being 16 single-berth (with toilet/basin facilities) "Roomette" cars. Passengers could purchase dinner, breakfast and other refreshments including alcoholic beverages and souvenirs in the buffet car, of which three of these were built, and each seated 42 alcove-style with tables. Four power-baggage vans completed the consists.

Replacement

The Railways Department attempted to replace the Northerner and Silver Star with a refurbished Silver Star which would be a 50% seating and 50% sleeper train, redeploy eight 30-seat cars from the Northerner rolling stock on the Wellington - Napier service, and relocate the three 32-seat and three 36-seat Endeavour cars to the Christchurch - Picton route, but these plans came to nothing after the Silver Star stock was withdrawn from service and blue asbestos insulation was found inside the coaches. The relevant union refused to work with the dangerous material, and the carriages lay parked in sidings for over ten years while their future was debated. Options included continuing with the refurbishment or using the trains on a double daily service (both overnight and daylight) to improve utilisation and enabling the train's externally similarly-styled daytime equivalent, the NZR RM class Silver Fern railcars, to be redeployed on other routes. However, the government baulked at the cost (which was estimated at being over $20 million to refurbish the train) given a large budget deficit and public debt, so decided against funding the refurbishment plan.

In December 1987, the Wellington-based Silver Star cars were taken to Auckland, where private tourist firm Pacific Trailways intended to convert all 27 passenger cars into a luxury tourist train that would travel around both North and South Islands for NZ $1000. Nothing eventuated and all the cars languished in Auckland for two more years.

In 1990, 24 of the 31 cars were purchased by the British luxury travel company, Orient Express Trains & Cruises and taken to A & G Price, of Thames, for regauging from New Zealand's 1067mm gauge to 1000mm gauge for Thai and Malaysian railway lines. An extensive internal rebuild and fit-out as well as exterior painting and badging was undertaken by the new owners at their (then) newly-constructed maintenance depot on KTMB land in Singapore's Keppel Road rail yards. Since then the refurbished consist has operated a regular 5-star luxury cruise-train service between Singapore and Bangkok as the Eastern & Oriental Express.

Six cars remain at A & G Price - two double sleepers, two single sleepers and two power vans. All are owned by Orient-Express Trains & Cruises.

External links

* [http://www.nzhistory.net.nz/media/photo/silver-star-poster "Silver Star" (NZR Publicity poster)]
* [http://www.nzhistory.net.nz/media/photo/silver-star "Silver Star at Wellington Station 1974" (NZR photo)]