The Only One Left: G1 and the Trans-Australian Express
G1 is the sole surviving standard gauge locomotive of the Commonwealth Railways. Every other one is gone. That's a short sentence with a lot behind it.
This 2025 50c Coloured Uncirculated Coin from the Royal Australian Mint's Steam Giants – Australian Rail Heritage collection features G1 — a machine with a national history that most of the state-based entries in the series can't claim.
G1 was built in 1914 to the design of the NSW P Class. At the time, it was among the largest locomotives operating anywhere in Australia. It was built for Commonwealth Railways — the federally run network connecting systems that the individual states hadn't linked — and it worked the Trans-Australian Express, the passenger service crossing the Nullarbor between Port Augusta and Kalgoorlie.
That line is remote in a way that's hard to overstate. Extreme heat. Dust. The longest straight stretch of railway track in the world. The locomotives working it didn't get much attention — they just had to keep running. G1 did that work for years.
When the steam era ended and Commonwealth Railways moved to diesel, the G Class was retired. Most were scrapped. G1 is what's left. It's now at the National Railway Museum in Port Adelaide, which holds one of the most serious collections of Australian rail heritage in the country. G1 is one of its standout exhibits.
The coin: 31.51mm diameter, 15.55 grams, copper-nickel, uncirculated finish. Mintage capped at 35,000. Price $17.50.
The last-survivor status is real, not a marketing claim. There is no other standard gauge Commonwealth Railways locomotive. That, combined with the Trans-Australian Express history and the national rather than state-specific context, makes this one of the more significant coins in the Steam Giants series. Collectors who know the history will recognise that quickly. Collectors who don't will find out.
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