Below rail — transport service contract

The 7 year Transport Service Contract (Rail Infrastructure) began in July 2006 and covers 70 per cent of the rail network in Queensland, some 6435 kilometres, including mainline, secondary and branch lines as well as the urban rail network. The term of the contract is 7 years from 1 July 2006 to 30 June 2013. The line sections not covered by the contract are the coal network and the Townsville–Mt Isa line, both of which operate commercially by QR Network Pty Ltd.

The state government supports the maintenance and enhancement of infrastructure on the network via the Transport Service Contract (Rail Infrastructure) with QR Network Pty Ltd. The Transport Service Contract (Rail Infrastructure) ensures the delivery of the government objectives of improving travel time, safety and reliability on non-economically viable rail infrastructure.

Under the Transport Service Contract (Rail Infrastructure) a regime of performance-based service levels are specified and continually monitored to maintain track performance. Some factors included in this monitoring process are temporary speed restrictions, below rail track availability, track condition and below-rail delays, all of which impact on efficiency of rail operations.

Also in this section:

• Long distance passenger transport service contract 
• Regional freight transport service contract
• Non-rail and non-operational transport service contracts