Kane Stevenson's page 'Kane's Trains – From South Australia to the World' steams up thousands of followers
Kane Stevenson (centre left at the National Railway Museum, Port Adelaide, in engine No.523) and images from Kane’s Trains – from South Australia to the World Facebook page: A freight train in Ghan livery (at left) pulling through the Adelaide Hills at Sleeps Hill, The Richi Richi Pass train (top right), a miniature train at Adelaide subruban Millswood (centre, right) and steam engine Rx 224, a South Australian Railways workhorse from 1915 and part of SteamRanger fleet since 2000.
Images courtesy Kane’s Trains – from South Australia to the World Facebook page
Kane Stevenson’s Adelaide trainspotting Facebook page, Kane’s Trains – from South Australia to the World, steamed past 17,000 followers in 2024.
As a "friendly neighbourhood rail nerd", Stevenson turned his pursuit of trains into a lifestyle of making it a day’s outing with friends. But he told ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) News Adelaide that he had driven eight to 12 hours “to get to a good spot for a certain train that was running".
Stevenson said part of his attraction to trains was seeing their power as they tackled slopes, with the Adelaide Hills offering one of the steepest sections of line out there: “Coming through Mount Lofty is surreal. You can hear the trains for a good 10 or 15 minutes before they get there."
Stevenson's interest in trains started at about 10 or 12 and was given a model train set for his birthday. At 16, he started filming and photographing trains. His favourite places to film in South Australia included Murray Bridge, Victor Harbor, Two Wells Mallala with the Pichi Richi Pass offering “incredible” Flinders Ranges scenery.
He admitted he could "cheat a little" by living at the Adelaide inner suburb of Goodwood, where he combined walking his dog, Kelly, along the line with filming footage of passing freight trains. Stevenson relied on friend and fellow train buff Stewart Whiteaker to kees all the details of their joint excursions. In the train community, word of mouth helped people work out the best locations to watch and film.
The vintage diesel engines from the 1940s and 1950s were some of Stevenson's favourites. As he continued to film and post, Stevenson gathered followers from interstate and overseas, with fans in India, America, the United Kingdom, Sri Lanka and Canada all interested to see South Australia's trains. He realised only in recent years that people really enjoyed also seeing the suburban Adelaide trains that he had overlooked as "a bit boring", while others found them interesting and even nostalgic.
