Brightling

Now its time for perhaps what will be the largest expose ever posted on the world wide web about the village of Brightling, New South Wales.

Brightling is 585 rail kilometres from Sydney and 123 kilometres from Dubbo.  It is reached 12 kilometres from Gular.  Arrival at Brightling marks the passage from Ewenmar County and the first stop at the Giliguldry Parish within Lincoln County.

Brightling was named for a local property, Brightling Park.  It also existed prior to the coming of the railway.  Indeed, owing to public need, the Brightling Park Public School had been established in June 1883, a full 20 years prior to the railway.

The initial railway infrastructure provided at Brightling, a station platform and a waiting shed, appears to have been appropriate to passenger demands and was not enhanced throughout the entire seven decade period of passenger rail services.

In July 1919 the Railway Commissioners’ Weekly Notices stated that the phonophore had been withdrawn from Brightling and installed at Coonamble.  Doubtless the local citizenry was astounded at the loss of this valuable civic asset.

A decade prior to the cessation of all passenger rail services on the line patrons of Brightling were told that trains would no longer routinely stop at this location.  Once again there is little doubt that those admittedly few patrons were well used to such civic disappointments, as the public school had closed as early as January 1909 and postal services had existed at Brightling only between 1907 and 1931.