Donnybrook Signal Faults, Victoria – April, 2026

13Apr/260

Donnybrook Signal Faults, Victoria – April, 2026

A usual Saturday pub lunch turned into a day full of excitement early-on as the Northbound Shepparton service I was riding on got to pass a spark at Essendon Station. This never happens... as Melbourne has removed nearly all passing loops at stations that may have existed in the past. Yes, we have some lines that have three tracks to allow a peak express in specific directions... but ask anyone on the Frankston line lately if there has even been an express scheduled! Anyway, no images of this.. just a jolt as we switched to the wrong-road to pass through the station... it was nice to skip the stopper and get a run through!

I hadn't originally planned to head to Donnybrook again so soon, but I made an executive decision after seeing that the XPT was over 2 hours late. I could easily get a photo in nice morning daylight. Turns out the southbound V/Line Albury services were also 1+ hours late due to 'vandalism'. I arrived at Donnybrook Station on-time, as the broad-gauge services were still running the schedule. It turns out the vandalism was only affecting standard-gauge line.

Before-long the northbound Apex Gravel Train came through with a Qube-liveried G class...

Always a nice surprise... but then again, seems to be a consistent runner. Also it seems that there'll be changes to this service in the future and therefore different locomotives and wagons! As the consist headed north... I saw something weird going on with the standard gauge signals at the start of Donnybrook Loop.

Of course, this didn't look healthy at all. Was the control tower trying to force the signal to a certain aspect? Or was the signal box going into a fail-safe mode? Showing a green really didn't feel safe though... as the Southbound 8610 V/Line service was due through.

It appeared, and held at the exit signals for the loop... which I assume were also doing bad things. The service also came down the loop, which was simply weird!

After a lot of stalling and crawling along, it finally exited the loop and crawled through the level crossing. At this point, I think it was well-over 90 minutes late. I feel sorry for anyone who needed to be in the city! The northbound XPT service, by this point, was over 2 hours late and had been sitting in Somerton Loop. 8610 crawled south at 20km/h past Somerton allowing the XPT to crawl at 20km/h north through to Donnybrook!

It actually snuck up on me... usually the level crossing gates will kick off way before you see the train. I was busy watching an episode of Yellowstone and just happened to look up at the right time.

I imagine the driver was in constant comms with the control tower trying to get the gates lowered at the right time? Either way, they finally lowered and the XPT crawled through.

The gates lifted and the XPT screeched to a halt right next to the pub.

The signals were flicking whilst the XPT was trying to enter the loop... which it shouldn't have had to as there was no train on the main.

Whilst it had a split-second green, it proceeded through the points... right as a southbound Sprinter came through.

Watching the data, the XPT then hit 100km/h for the first time on the trip once it exited Donnybrook Loop. Another train-load of unhappy customers! Speaking of such things, 8612 came south, around 90 minutes late.

The gravel had loaded in Kilmore East and made it's way back into town.

If you check the middle shot, you'll see the signals were still flipping red to green and that the points were still stuck on the diverge.

I was still up the wrong end of the platform when I saw a northbound freight on the SG. Surprisingly, they let 7MS1 depart Dynon, knowing it'd be a struggle to get out of Melbourne city limits.

It absolutely crawled through the crossing... coming to a halt. Unlike the XPT which could clear the crossing, this freight was longer and held the gates down, causing quite a traffic build-up!

The end wagon happened to have no containers... so I'm sure some drivers at the back were wondering what the hold-up was!

That was it for the trains and I skipped the next city-bound V/Lo as it was full and standing wasn't preferable. You can see that the weather was rolling in above and this treated me to a great view out the window!