dutton park

i have spent the last few blog entries talking about our home stations and closest stations, so now it is time to actually talk about a destination station for a change. for me, most of the time, dutton park is my destination of a morning, so this time, i am writing about dutton park. this station is on the beenleigh line, and is actually the first station of the beenleigh line, following park road. the next station after dutton park on the beeneligh line is fairfield. i have never actually been any further south by train than dutton park, so hopefully this blog will get me traveling along the beenleigh and gold coast lines a little bit more so i can ultimately collect all of those stations on my card and get photos of them for this project.

the main reason i go to dutton park almost every morning, is because this is the dutton park station is right next to the university of queensland school of pharmacy, which is called the pharmacy australia centre of excellence (or pace for short. somehow they let me in....) pace is located right next door to the princess alexandra hospital, and is literally just up the road from the dutton park station. not only is pace home to some of the best lecturers, but it is close to a train station - now thats what i call really awesome. each morning we leave home in emerald hill and drive to dinmore station, and catch the train in to the city. depending on how we are going for time, sometimes i will get to go in with karen as far as central and we will get a cup of tea before she heads to work in the city and i catch another train to uni. most mornings, uni is at pace, though once a week we are at the university campus itself at st lucia. the mornings i am at pace, i try to aim for a beenleigh train, or if one is going through central, a yerongpilly train will also do nicely. sometimes i am lucky and can catch either of these, other times i can get either a cleveland, gold coast or a park road and walk from park road station to pace, which isnt really that far anyway, and is something i should be doing more of for exercise since all i do all day at uni is sit on my bum in lectures eating to try to stay awake and hear what is being taught (please note that that comment does not mean i am bored in class, it is simply that if my sugar gets too low, i have been known to seizure in lectures, so it is more a preventative measure than anything!) to walk from park road to pace you actually walk past the dutton park station and sometimes before i leave park road i check the screen on platform 1 and have seen that there is a beenleigh coming to the station in 8 or 9 minutes and decided not to wait for it, and as i am getting to pace, the beenleigh is pulling into the dutton park station. that always makes me feel good that i walked for exercise instead of waiting at park road because i got there faster under my own steam. it is like i am being rewarded for effort.

another thing i like about dutton park station is that since it is so close to pace, and you can see pace from the station and see the station from pace. i think that is really cool, and i have got photos to prove it!

the days i am at st lucia, i can catch any of the trains going south, the cleveland, gold coast, beenleigh, park road, springfield or ipswich. if i get a springfield or ipswich, i will go as far as toowong then catch the bus to chancellors place, otherwise i will detrain at park road and walk or bus (mostly bus because i am lazy) and arrive at the uq lakes. i like the mornings i am at uq, because i can leave karen after our cup of tea and walk back into central and catch the very next southbound train without having a care in the world. it is awesome to just rock into central, glance up and see what train is next and head to whichever platform it happens to be arriving on.

after a day at pace, most of the time i will catch a ferny grove train back into the city from dutton park station, of if my friends and i have been talking for too long and the ferny grove as been and gone, we will walk to park road and catch a city bound train from there. if we finish early, i change trains at roma street and catch the ipswich back to dinmore, but that rarely happens for two reasons: 1. we seldom finish early, and 2. the ipwich train is usually just departing roma street as the ferny grove is arriving, so it is pointless detraining and waiting at roma street for the next on in half an hour for another ipswich train. i usually end up  going to the city and staying out the back of karens store studying, and then we catch the same train home together of an evening, the ipswich train from platform 5 of central at about 6:30 pm. on most week nights, there is a very good chance you will see the two of us together at the fortitude valley end of the platform. occasionally i have gone in as far as bowen hills to get on the ipswich train sooner so i can be guaranteed a seat. actually, that is the only reason i have ever been to the bowen hills station! (and also eagle junction station for that matter...)

one of the things i like about dutton park, aside from it being my primary destination, is that there are a lot of diesels that travel through the station on their way to the brisbane port. as i have mentioned on countless occasions in my blogs about other stations, i really like the diesels, and since they travel through my old primary station of norman park and my new primary station of dinmore, it is just a wonderful coincidence that they also happen to travel through dutton park station also. it fits in beautifully with my obsessive compulsive disorder. it is fun to wait for a train at dutton park of an afternoon with friends when a diesel comes past to distract me from our conversation. sometimes they are carrying coal to the port, other times they have shipping containers. sometimes i even get to see empty coal trains or cargo trains on their way back from the port after unloading their cargo. i am convinced australia must export a heck of a lot of coal because the number of coal trains we hear going through dutton park when we are in the library meant to be studying or doing assignments, but we are eating, talking, laughing, writing funny messages on the communal whiteboard, writing blogs about trains or downloading youtube clips (or maybe even studying!). there are constantly diesels going through dutton park. i love it!

once when i was waiting for the ferny grove train from dutton park to the city, i was lucky enough to be able to hear the points change for the diesel that was approaching, to be able to send it towards the cleveland line. i looked up just in time to see it, i had been waiting for months to see the points change at any station, thinking roma street would be my best chance, and wouldnt you know it, it happens at dutton park - my primary destination. it couldnt be much cooler than that for someone as compulsive as myself. it made me very happy!

the beenleigh train on platform 1 of dutton park station, i got this photo after getting off the train one morning to go to uni at pace. dutton park is as far south as i have been on either the beenleigh or gold coast lines. hopefully some time soon i can head past dutton park and venture into the unknown!

this is the station sign for dutton park. this sign is on platform 1, looking towards pace. that large building behind the sign is pace, where we have uni 4 days a week, the other day each week is at the st lucia campus. when we are at st lucia, i change trains at indooroopilly to get an all stations train to toowong and a bus from toowong to the university campus. quite often at indooroopilly, the all stations will end up leaving before everyone has run up the steps and over to the platform on which it is waiting. its a shame these two trains dont coordinate so that people can disembark the express service for the all stations.

i have no idea how long this was at dutton park, but the morning i saw it, i simply had to get a photo! this portable potty was on platform 1 of the dutton park station, near the exit. it was amusing that it appeared suddenly and was gone almost as suddenly. i dont think there are actually any toilets at dutton park station, i certainly havent seen any, but nor have i had the need for them. whats even more amusing is that my viking heritage has been attached to the humble throne. while mentioning toilets, i should add that the toilet at norman park station is particularly spacious, much more so than this little thunderbox.

looking down at the dutton park station from the road overpass. platform 1 is on the right and platform 2 is on the left. this shot is looking towards park road. pace is off to the right but not exactly visible. the one frustrating thing about this little station is that this is the only overpass, so people who come in on a ferny grove train from the beenleigh line and want to go to pace have to walk all the way along the steps and ramp on the left of the shot and walk along the road from where i took this photo to be able to get to pace. while this doesnt affect me in anyway, since dutton park is as far south as i have ever been to date, it would be good if there were a footbridge. i presume that the demand isnt exactly high for one though. this station is pretty convenient for people who may be wanting to ravel to the princess alexandra hospital as well as the hospital is next door to pace, and a lot of nurses get off the train here of a morning.

 

here is a shot of a dutton park sign on platform 1 from platform 2. this time i have included the train tracks in the shot also. the small yellow bars around the light post and sign serve as some sort of fence, im still not sure why these need to be fenced though. pace is to the left, but not visible. the road overpass is the the right, also not visible. i like that the font for dutton park is nice and bold, much easier to read at a distance than poor dinmore. it is not uncommon for me to collect 4 stations in a day: dinmore to central, central to park road, walk from park road to pace, then train from dutton park back to central, then central to home with karen. recently i managed to get norman park in to my day and collected 5 stations in a day, where i had to catch a cleveland train from central to visit marie for her birthday, then got a shorncliffe train back inbound to park road before uni (the beenleigh was just leaving park road as the shorncliffe arrived. that always happens!!) and then had to walk from park road to pace. i think that is a pretty good effort for a day, 5 stations without trying! i really like this photo, it is almost good enough for wikipaedia!

this is a shot from platform 2 looking towards the park road end of the dutton park station. pace and the hospital are to the right, not exactly visible behind platform 1. the airport train had gone through, and i was waiting for the ferny grove which was due (as the light is green, so nothing had been through recently!) there is a sort of repair yard to the right. sometimes you get to hear the whistles from pace of small diesels as they stop at this location. im still not sure what they do, but it appears to be some kind of maintenance work.

the beenleigh train is arriving on platform 1 of the dutton park station. i was waiting further down the platform because i didnt want the people waiting to think i was taking photos of them, and didnt think they would understand me taking photos of a train station! i am under the overpass which is why this photo is pretty dark. i am still to catch the beenleigh train any further south than dutton park. one of my friends is the exact opposite: she has yet to catch a train any further north than the dutton park station as she lives on the beenleigh line, and her primary station is altandi.

platform 1 of dutton park, as taken from platform 2 from under the overpass. this time, not train or people waiting for a train, since the beenleigh has already been through to pick them up. the beenleigh usually comes before the ferny grove.

this is one of the dutton park signs on platform 1, looking across form platform 2 at the fairfield end of the station. it is rather pretty with the art work on the wall behind the sign. i think more stations should have local people do art on their stations, like at norman park. the art is nice to look at and is a deterrent for graffiti artists. i cant understand why more stations dont have a feature wall like this. 

this is platform 1 of dutton park from platform 2 towards the fairfield end of the station, i waited for the beenleigh train to depart to capture the art without a train obstructing it for this photo.

'the train arriving on platform 2 is the brisbane city and ferny grove train stopping all stations.' you can see a bit of the artwork along platform 1 from this photo. in the university holidays i actually caught the ferny grove train all the way to the end of the line at ferny grove, only to tag off to get the stat for my card, then tag back on again to ride back to the city. alas, i hadnt thought of this blog at the time so i didnt get any photos of my journey.

this is a dutton park sign on platform 2, at the fairfield end of the station, and i have captured the traffic overpass in the photo. behind the white station fence is the track for the diesels which they use to bypass park road and head along the cleveland line to the port of brisbane.

speaking of the devil, here is a diesel on that very track! this little diesel took the overpass which bypasses park road station to join the cleveland line at buranda - i watched it as long as i could before it disappeared from sight. queensland seems to export a hell of a lot of coal.

the points! these are the first set of points i had heard and seen move since coming to brisbane! ok, so most of you are thinking 'so what' but hey, i think it is cool, because these things must change thousands of times a day all over the network, yet you never see it or appreciate it (unless something goes wrong...) i think it is even cooler that i got to see them change at dutton park, a station i have spent a lot of time at over the last few years waiting for trains! these points allow the passage of diesels and the occasional commuter train to alter direction from dutton park to go either through park road (commuter trains and the occasional diesel) or bypass park road and join the cleveland line at buranda. from the way they are set in this photo, the next train appears as though it will be bypassing park road and joining the cleveland line to go to the port of brisbane.

you can see the points a bit better here, but also the overpass that bypasses park road and turns to the right where it joins the cleveland line at buranda station. this shot was taken after class late one afternoon, where i was going from dutton park to central to meet up with karen at the store and catch the same train home that evening: our ipswich train departing platform 5 around 6:30pm.

just another shot of the points, at dutton park station. they are surprisingly loud when they change, so loud that when i heard them changing i was thinking 'what on earth is that noise' then realized and ran up the steps in time to get high enough to see them moving.

platform 1 of dutton park from platform 2. you can see pace beautifully in the background from this shot. see that big grey thing between the wooden shelter and the white billboard? that is pace. it looks pretty sterile, but it is a very good school (no i am not being paid to say this!) i am still surprised that i even got accepted into the school in the first place, and yet somehow i have made it to third year. most of my friends get to pace each morning via the train, though a few do catch the bus. i am terrible on a bus, and notorious for being bus sick, but i can ride on a train all day quite happily! they yellow box near the exit is where we tag off our cards to end our journey when getting off a beenleigh or yeerongpilly train. most mornings my journey to dutton park is free, because it is classed as continuation from central. i have friends who catch trains to dutton park from many different stations including darra, richlands, taringa, milton, altandi, mitchelton, yeronga, birkdale, shorncliffe, robina, and peter at redbank who isnt in pharmacy but is still one of my best friends.

this is the dutton park station from pace, though it is a little bit hard to see it from this distance, essentially the white fence is the station. 

i walked a bit closer to dutton park station to get this photo from the front of pace, you can see it a bit better now. you can clearly see the gray metal of the staircase and ramp leading from the station to he road on platform 2.

this is another shot of the station from the ground of pace, where you can see the fence, the station office on platform 2, the shelter on platform 1, the diesel track that runs behind the dutton park station and a dutton park sign. not a bad effort.

this shot was taken from the road on the platform 1 side of dutton park. i was trying to capture the ramp and staircase on platform 2. it is a shame that you have to walk right up and around the road overpass to change platforms, which makes getting photos for my trainspotting blog a challenge, which is why the photos in this blog were taken over several days.

i turned around after taking the previous photo to get a shot of pace from dutton park station. it is literally just across the road, so the train is definitely one of the easiest ways to get to pace of a morning. 

while i was getting a photo of pace, i heard that an express train would be passing the station, and thought it would be a diesel, so was pleasantly surprised to see a gold coast train passing through dutton park station on this particular morning. i am yet to catch the gold coast train any further than park road since it runs express from park road to beenleigh stopping only at coopers plains and loganlea. i will have to catch it to coopers plains some day and catch a ferny grove train back to dutton park so i can see some of the other stations on the beenleigh line.

i got another shot of the gold coast as it sped through dutton park station. this shot doesnt really capture the speed at which the goal coast travels through this station, but it is definitely moving fast as it passes through. 

 

here is a shot i got to show the dutton park station office. i made a recent discovery that there at toilets inside this building, though am yet to need to use these facilities. you can see the diesel tracks again well on this photo to the left of the shot.
 

platform 2 of dutton park station from the park road end of the platform, looking towards the fairfield end of the station across at platform 1. the ramp and staircase are to the immediate right, and pace would be up to the left, but is not visible here. i think this is another wikipaedia worthy shot. possibly my best shot of the station?
 

this shot was just to show the sign that shows that platform 2 of dutton park is the side that takes you to the city, with the ferny grove train stopping here on its way inbound, while platform 1 is serviced by the beenleigh train. the gold coast is the express service running south, and its opposite is the airport train which runs express to the north and begins stopping all stations from park road.
 

whenever a diesel chugs past, no matter what station i am at, i cant resist getting a photo! here two diesels together pass dutton park station. 

the gold coast train passes through dutton park on its way to its next stop, coopers plains. i am looking forward to catching a gold coast in the holidays. the model of train that is shown here is wifi enabled, which means i can take my laptop with me and blog about trains as i go. i am looking forward to doing that!
 

i didnt realise that the dutton park platforms werent even until i walked all the way to the end of platform 2 to get this shot from the fairfield end looking back towards park road. it is not quite as uneven as riverview, that station is very lopsided! you can see the overpass beautifully in this shot.
 

i turned around to get a shot of the tracks from the fairfield end looking on towards what for me is still the unknown. this is precisely as far south as i have been on a train yet. it is a bit sad really - the end of the dutton park platform! after exams, i will be rectifying that.
 

i had a similar photo to this one earlier, but this one shows the full shelter on platform 1. and yes, there is pace in the background behind the sizzler billboard.
 

'the train arriving on platform 1 is the beenleigh train, stopping all stations.' this is actually a pretty descent photo of the dutton park station, the platform and the beenleigh train looking towards the fairfield end of the platform.

the beenleigh train, looking towards the park road end of platform 2. the train was about to depart the dutton park station for fairfield. 

this is the overpass again, this time looking at it from the park road end of platform 2 of dutton park station. i remember the very first time i tried to catch the train to dutton park was from norman park and marie had told me to change trains at park road. i had full intention of timing the journey so i would know how long to allow myself for my journey in the mornings and could back calculate a departure time from home when we were living near garden city. this was in the week before i was about to start uni, and i had decided that i would dedicate my only day off to planning my journey. it was a really rainy messy day, and when the shorncliffe train pulled in to park road, the power went out and all the trains were disrupted. we waited at park road for several hours before power was restored and i was able to get on a beenleigh to dutton park. at the time i had no idea that dutton park was the very next station on the beenleigh line, nor that it was within walking distance. i can remember getting off at dutton park and walking through heaps of mud to see pace. i think for memory i thought it was a rather uneventful day and a disappointing journey that had taken many unnecessary extra hours to complete, and i hadnt even returned to norman park. i am pretty sure that i ended up getting a few free bottles of water from the queensland rail people as a way of apologizing for the inconvenience. 
it is funny to think back at memories like this, and know they have been eclipsed with wonderful memories of learning, making friends, getting results back and having lecturers sing to us about anti-depressants. dutton park is one of my favorite stations, not because of the station itself, but because of the destination at the end of it.