Echuca Line

The railway to Echuca was one of the first built in Victoria to link the capital city and port with the expansive Murray River trade and riverina district. The line was built to a high standard with double track as far as Bendigo and many stone bridges, viaducts and tunnels. The line takes a substantially straight alignment except for a detour via Clarkefield due to political influence of wealthy land speculators.

Retained as a broad guage main line, the Echuca Line serves both freight and passenger services. Regular passenger services operated by V/Line Passenger run as far as Bendigo with occasional servces extended to Echuca on weekends. The Echuca passenger trains were reintroduced during the 1990s after a long absence.

Until recently steam passenger services were also operated by South Western Railway Society to Echuca on the last Sunday of every month. However this has now finished due to insurance problems.

Electrified suburban trains run along the Echuca Line as far as Watergardens following extension of the overhead from St Albans in 2002. The section of track between Watergardens and Echuca is currently proposed to be upgraded as part of the 'Fast Rail' program. However as part of this 'upgrade' it is proposed to introduce the apparent retrograde step of single tracking the existing double track section of line between Kyneton and Bendigo.