Don’t get too excited if you think you saw a new passenger train travelling through western Victoria this week.

Unfortunately this is not the long awaited return of passenger rail services, but the annual visit of a track recording train, operated by the Australian Rail Track Corporation, to the standard gauge branch lines in this part of the rail system.

Whilst the train does look deceptively like a passenger train, it consists of a locomotive and three former passenger coaches that have been fitted out with equipment to record the condition of the tracks.

This train covers the mainline network between Perth, Adelaide, Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane twice a year and includes the Victorian branch lines once a year.

On this visit the train travelled to Ouyen, Mildura and Murrayville in the Mallee for the first time following the standardising of the gauge of these lines last year, linking them to the national network via Maryborough and Ararat.

The train travelled the Mallee lines over the weekend, the Hopetoun line yesterday and the Rainbow line today.

It is scheduled to continue towards Adelaide tomorrow.