You can hear their bravado; those who declare, despite the guffaws from friends, that they will be commuting from Newcastle to Sydney by rail. “No, five hours a day on the train is fine. I can read, watch movies, sleep. All that time to myself. Looking forward to it, actually.” Three months later, they are pale, glassy eyed,unable to read as they stare into middle distance; “no more”, they whisper, “please. No more.” They have been broken by the train journey known to locals, with a certain crude brilliance and no affection whatsoever, as the “Shitkansen”. For what sins have the people of Newcastle and the Central Coast been punished with such a rail service? When in 2012, the NSW government announced with great fanfare “the biggest timetable changes in a generation”, they were apparently referring to the “Greatest Generation” who survived the Great Depression and World War Two, as the journey from Newcastle to Sydney Central now takes longer than it did using steam engines in the 1930